CLASS TEACHING 
AND MANAGEMENT I 



I 




WILLIAM ESTAB ROOK CHANCELLOR 



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Class L 

Book. 






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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT; 



Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/classteachingman01chan 





CLASS TEACHING 


AND 


MANAGEMENT 


BY 

WILLIAM ESTABROOK CHANCELLOR 

author of '• 
"our schools: their administration and supervision" 


ILLUSTRATED 


II eEcoNTEi \\ 


m 


HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 
M C MX 





YOUR EYES 



Your eyes are worth more to you than 
any book. 

Your safety and your success in life depend 
on your eyes; therefore take care of them. 

Always hold your head up when you read. 

Hold your book fourteen inches from your 
face. 

Be sure that the light is clear and good. 
Never read in a bad light. 

Never read with the sun shining directly 
on the book. 

Never face the light in reading. 

Let the light come from behind or over 
your left shoulder. 

Avoid books or papers printed indistinctly 
or in small type. 

Rest your eyes by looking away from the 
book every few. moments. 

Cleanse your eyes night and morning with 
pure water. 

These are the recommendations of the Committee on 
Children's Welfare Association of Women Principals, 
New Fork, and the Advisory Board of Oculists. 



Copyright, igio, by 
William Estabeook Chancellor 



Published October, 1910. 
Printed in the United States of America 



CLA273339 






TO MY FRIEND 
JOHN HOWARD DICKASON 

OF THE UNIVERSITY OF WOOSTER 

EDUCATOR 

" Come ye after me, and I will make you to become 
fishers of men." — Jesus, Gospel of Mark, i, 17. 



"In all things lives and reigns an eternal law. Education 
consists in leading man, as he grows into self-consciousness , 
to the free representation of the inner law of the unity of 
God, man, and Nature. The representation of the in- 
finite in the finite, of the eternal in the temporal, of unity 
in diversity confronts us as the one aim of education. 
School means the thoughtful communication of knowledge, 
for definite purposes and in definite inner connection. It 
is the destiny of man to become, through instruction and 
training, a conscious, reasonable, self -active, and free being 
in whom necessity calls forth freedom, law, self-deter- 
mination, external compulsion, inner free-will, and exter- 
nal hate, inner love." — Froebel, The Education of Man. 
(Abridged.) 1825. 



PREFACE 

THE purpose of this book is to present the principles 
of class teaching in respect both to instruction and 
to discipline. This treatment of the theory and prac- 
tice of class instruction is intended for use in teachers' 
reading circles and as a text-book in professional schools 
of education. It is a development of systematic courses 
of lectures summer and winter in the Universities of 
Chicago and of Wooster, and in George Washington 
University, and of occasional lectures at various other 
universities, at several normal schools, and at many 
teachers' institutes. 

In an experience as superintendent of schools in four 
different cities — Bloomfield and Paterson, New Jersey; 
the District of Columbia, both white and colored schools; 
and Norwalk, Connecticut, and as a visitor in fifteen 
hundred schools in more than half the States of the 
Union — I have learned that while systems of organiza- 
tion and of administration are many and various, pre- 
senting opposite extremes and apparently every form 
of compromise, the business of the class teacher is 
standardized in but three forms whether for East, 
West, North or South. 

This book is an exposition of these standard forms 
of class teaching. 

W. E. C. 

Town of Norwalk, Conn. 



CONTENTS 
AND SYLLABUS OF CHAPTERS 

CHAPTER I 

The Learning Processes from the Point of View of Teaching 

Relations of learner and teacher:— Studies and exercises. — Progress 
of different kinds of pupils in different kinds of subjects. — Idea, 
function, habit, character. — Motivation, attention, interest, asso- 
ciation, judgment, reasoning Page 3 

CHAPTER II 

The Teaching Processes from the Point of View of Learning 

Helping the learner and transmitting knowledge. — Limitations con- 
stitute the nature of art. — The general teaching process. — Special 
teaching processes; inductive recitations; deductive lessons; 
question-and-answer reviews; study-lessons; drills; laboratory 
experiments; lectures; seminars; library -work; translations- 
tests and examinations Page 25 

CHAPTER III 

Department Teaching — Grade Teaching — District School 
Teaching 

Reasons for the several kinds and grades of schools. — -The lower 
limits of department teaching and the upper limits of grade teach- 
ing. — The several principles of department teaching. — The prin- 
ciples of grade teaching. — 'The causes of the rural school consoli- 
dation movement. — Grading the district school that has but one 
teacher. — Advantages of such a school. — In all kinds of schools, 
written work, reviews, examinations. — Change and progress. 

Page 67 
ix 



CONTENTS AND SYLLABUS OF CHAPTERS 

CHAPTER IV 

The Teacher as Interpreter op the Course op Study 

The child's world. — Qualities requisite in the teacher. — A philoso- 
phy of life. — Prevalence of one temperament among teachers. — 
The dominant importance of ideas. — A philosophy of knowledge. 
— The problem of the adjustment of foreigners to Americanism. — 
The unity of mind. — Scholarship and conduct. — Ethical versus 
materialistic views and principles Page 93 

CHAPTER V 

The Day's Work — Its Plan and Record 

The variety of duties. — Frictions. — Daily preparation. — Daily pro- 
grams in a graded elementary school. — High school programs. — 
Advance plans versus records of accomplishment. — A new class. 

Page 119 

CHAPTER VI 

Control op the Class and of the Individual 

Review of terms used in education. — The force-theory. — The skill- 
theory. — School-and-home theory. — Pupil self-government theory. 
— Manual work in relation to discipline. — Virtue is at the point of 
strain. — Moral aims in education. — Means to attain them. — When 
is corporal punishment necessary ? — Seating a class so as to avoid 
unnecessary conditions leading to disorder. — Directing the move- 
ments of the class. — Fire-drills. — The mechanics of class control. 
— Learning each pupil.— Physical defects. — Schools and classes 
for the incorrigible, for the defective, for the laggard, for the 
blind, for the deaf, for the crippled. — Tests of feeble-mindedness. 
— The reasonable standards of conduct in children and youth. — 
The school virtues Page 145 

CHAPTER VII 

Classifying, Marking, Grading and Promoting Pupils 

What numbers properly constitute classes in the various schools 
and grades? — The count-system in marking. — Four factors in 
grading, — age, home opportunities, native powers, actual attain- 
ments. — Conspectus of elementary course of study. — Frequency 



CONTENTS AND SYLLABUS OF CHAPTERS 

of grading. — Retardation. — Machinery versus personality. — The 
"trick" of relative standards versus the justice of absolute stand- 
ards so far as these are humanly possible. — Why the class teachers 
generally should decide promotions, — and when they should not 
do so. — The precocious, the normal, the altricious. — Psychical ages 
versus physical. — The locus of a study. — Overcrowded curricu- 
lums. — Study-periods at school Page 199 



CHAPTER VIII 

How to Make a Good School and a Good Class 

The school as seen by a visitor.— Active attention, absorbed atten- 
tion, deliberative attention. — [Order and decorum of the pupils. — 
The use of the English language. — Voice. — Condition of the room 
itself. — School equipment. — Qualifications as seen by systematic 
observers. — Aims of the good class teacher. — The school spirit. 
— Interest of each pupil in his own welfare: self - activity. — 
The school neighborhood. — The financial authorities. — Public 
opinion Page 235 



CHAPTER IX 

The Class Teacher and the Industrial Arts 

The investment of one's own life. — The extension of education. — 
Its expansion. — Teachers of the familiar subjects. — Preparation 
for the new subjects. — Agriculture. — The mechanic arts. — The 
business arts. — Domestic science. — Domestic arts. — Principles 
controlling social action in reference to educational progress. — 
The universal school and expressive activities . . Page 259 



CHAPTER X 

The Teacher's Own Life in an Age of Educational Expansion 

Relations with superior officers. — Questions usually asked of can- 
didates for positions. — Progress in scholarship. — One's library. — 
Health. — Recreation. — Vacations. — Public, private, endowed, and 
ecclesiastical school positions. — Elementary, secondary, and higher 
positions. — Learning some of the lessons of life . . Page 285 

xi 



CONTENTS AND SYLLABUS OF CHAPTERS 

APPENDIX 

PAGE 

I. An Open Letter to One Who Is Just Beginning 

to Teach 299 

II. An Open Letter to the Experienced Class Teacher 301 

III. The Choice of Text-Books 303 

IV. Outline op a Standard Minimum Course of Study 

Based upon the Course in the Schools of Cin- 
cinnati, Ohio 305 

V. Illustrative Lesson Plans and Examination . .312 

VI. Illustrative Teachers' Examinations 322 

VII. Rules and Regulations for a District School . . 329 

VIII. Suggested English Exercises in Correlation with 

Other Subjects for Both Urban and Rural 

Schools 331 

Index 333 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

A COOKING CLASS. WASHINGTON IRVING HIGH SCHOOL, 

NEW YORK CITY Frontispiece 

AN OUT-OF-DOOR KINDERGARTEN. STATE NORMAL 

SCHOOL, SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA Facing p. 18 

NATURE-STUDY APPLIED TO ARITHMETIC " 10S 

VACANT-LOT GARDENING BY PUPILS OF THE CLEVELAND 

SCHOOLS " 268 



"According to my experience, success in education de- 
pends upon whether what is taught to children commends 
itself to them as true, through being closely connected with 
their own personal observation and consideration. With- 
out this foundation, truth must seem to them little better 
than a plaything or perhaps a burden. Man is impelled by 
the nature of the powers that he possesses to use and to 
train them, and thereby to develop and improve them." 
— Pestalozzi, On his Work at Stanz. 1799. 



CLASS TEACHING AND 

MANAGEMENT 



CHAPTER I 

THE LEARNING PROCESSES 
FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF TEACHING 

Relations of learner and teacher. — Studies and exercises. — Progress 
of different kinds of pupils in different kinds of subjects. — Idea, func- 
tion, habit, character. — Motivation, attention, interest, association, 
judgment, reasoning. 

THE child goes to school to learn. Curiosity impels 
him. Or the child is sent to school to learn. His 
parents or relatives or officers of the law compel him to 
go. Teaching the child who goes to school of his own 
desire is not the same thing as teaching one who must 
be sent. Nor does the child who goes voluntarily, even 
eagerly, learn at school in the same fashion as does the 
child who goes unwillingly. 

The purpose of the school-going of the child is to 
learn knowledge and habits. What and how much he 
learns depend upon many things, — his own curiosity and 
docility, his health and strength, his mental powers; 
the scholarship, the industry, the skill and the char- 
2 3 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

acter of his teacher; the opportunities of the school, 
its building, equipment, apparatus; the subjects taught; 
the books and supplies used; his comrades. 

In its simple and original sense, to "learn" means to 
"go over," to "travel again." In its simple and original 
sense, to "teach" is to "show" or to "tell." The teacher 
shows the learner what to go over and how to go over, 
while the learner, hearing what the teacher tells or see- 
ing what the teacher shows, travels again the road by 
which the teacher has come to knowledge. 

Learning from a teacher is a wonderful economy, for 
it saves learning by experiment with its constant errors 
and many failures and with its few successes. Teaching 
those who do not yet know has been an essential part 
of the transmission of the arts of life from those who 
know to the ignorant, in every period of culture and 
civilization. School-teaching is but one phase of the 
whole matter, though in the modern age it has come to 
transcend all other phases in the general interest of 
men. And schooling, which is the preparation of child- 
hood and of youth in economic leisure for activities and 
enterprises of life that are not open to the unschooled, 
is now part of our common democratic faith and 
practice. 

Learning, then, is going over, — once, twice, perhaps 
many times, till one knows, and often many, many 
times after one knows. Going over again and again till 
one knows is one kind of learning; going thereafter is 
another kind of learning, so different that we no longer 
use this term. The first kind of learning has several 
stages in it, — Seeing or hearing, understanding, remem- 
bering, trying, succeeding, doing, repeating, drilling. 
Suddenly, there comes the consciousness that one really 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

has learned and now knows. With this discovery, the 
first kind of learning ends — unless or until one forgets. 
Seldom, however, does one really forget what one really 
has learned. This " forgetting," as it is called, is getting 
something else in the way, as in the confusion due to 
excitement; or it is failing to get anything at all, as in 
the empty-minded weakness of fatigue or ill-health. 
The only forgetting that is serious is due either to long 
lapse of years or to great changes either in the cell- 
structure or relations of the brain, as in childhood or 
severe illness or in the associations of one's life, as re- 
moval to distant scenes. Even so, often one remem- 
bers, years and years later or thousands of miles away, 
things that one supposes forgotten absolutely. 

The forgetting of the child, when asked regarding 
something that he learned or knew a few minutes or a 
few days before, is due usually to his inability to sum- 
mon remembrance at will because he is full of sensations 
and motivations and is not yet in control of himself. 
Unless due to this condition of his mental life because 
he is a child, his forgetting is probably competent evi- 
dence that in fact he had not learned and did not pre- 
viously know what he professed to know, or was supposed 
to know, before. 

The other and higher kind of learning, the going over 
of what one really does know, is using it, or functioning 
in respect to its subject matter. The first kind leaves 
one in a state of proficiency or skill; the second kind 
leads into science or into art or into philosophy. 

Learning at school has the various stages of seeing 
or otherwise observing by the senses, perceiving or 
understanding, remembering, trying to do, succeeding 
therein, doing and repeating, and last drilling until one 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

knows or has learned. It is a process through which 
one can never carry another. The teacher may show; 
the pupil must perform. 

Here, between the teacher and the learner, arises a 
relation of importance. The greater the skill of the 
teacher, the larger is the number of those whom he or 
she can develop by teaching, — that is, helping to learn. 
A teacher of genuine skill can develop the mediocre, even 
the dull; a teacher of but little proficiency scarcely 
educates the average pupils; a teacher of no qualifica- 
tions actually discourages even the pupils of talent. 
Good teaching, therefore, means the success of a rela- 
tively large portion of the learners in a class. And good 
(or true) teaching is primarily nothing else than in- 
sight into these learning processes and industry in follow- 
ing the suggestions of insight, for the benefit of the 
learners. 

When it is said that "the good teacher is born," what 
is meant is that he (or she) has native insight into and 
sympathy with the mental process of learning and a 
desire to help the learner forward. Whether a good 
teacher can be made out of a person without such in- 
sight, sympathy and desire is simply a question whether 
the person can be so educated as to develop this power 
of insight and these qualities of sympathy and desire. 

Work at school is commonly classified into studies 
and exercises. Not to try to draw distinctions too finely 
here, one may say that studies are concerned with facts 
and principles: they are concerned with what is often 
called " knowledge." Exercises are concerned with ac- 
tivities, crafts, arts. The difference may be illustrated 
by citing history as a study and drawing as an exercise. 

The distinction is not to be pushed too far. To write a 

6 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

composition on some historical topic is to use history as 
an exercise: to learn the theory of perspective in draw- 
ing is to pursue drawing as a study. 

In actual class-room practice, the learning process as 
it is guided by the teacher in respect to a study differs 
considerably from the learning process involved in an 
exercise. To learn a history lesson, one reads the pas- 
sage or listens to a recital of the facts; then one thinks 
about the facts, severally and collectively, trying to 
understand or interpret them in the light of facts and 
truths already known; next one recalls in due order 
the facts of the passage : then follows an oral or written 
recitation upon the topic; and this recitation is repeated 
and reviewed in analysis and in association over and 
over in drill until the topic is learned. To accomplish 
this process, one needs to read or to hear accurately; 
eye or ear must be keen and true. The next stage in 
the process is that of summoning enough knowledge to 
enable one to understand the words heard or read. 
We cannot teach history at all to small children be- 
cause they do not yet know enough social and his- 
torical facts to understand any historical topic. We 
say that they do not yet know the meaning of words: 
what we mean is that they have as yet no content of 
knowledge for the words to designate. The other 
stages of the process, — recalling, trying to use, suc- 
ceeding, doing and drilling, — are without the technical 
difficulties of this second stage of apperception or 
understanding; but they are quite as necessary for 
the completion of a real act of learning. When we 
have only the power to remember a thing and cannot 
use it, we do not yet know the thing. 

This getting of our knowledge beyond the stage of 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

mere recall, to the point where it helps us understand 
new facts and can perform, as it were, the mental di- 
gestive function is a mysterious enough matter. Per- 
haps it can be best understood by an illustration. Ever 
since humanity began upon the earth, it has been 
entirely obvious that all men are alike creatures of 
one universal Nature (" children of one common Father," 
to put this truth in religious phrase); but men were 
long centuries in discovering that there is a resultant 
truth, — that all are equal (that is, "brothers/' in the 
religious term). At last, however, this idea or fact be- 
came a truth that went to work in the minds of men 
and began to overthrow governments of privilege and 
to establish democracy. It overthrew serfdom in Russia 
and slavery in America. Where this idea will end in 
its business of digesting the old social institutions, of 
course, we cannot foresee. 

Perhaps another illustration will serve better. Often, 
a child knows verbatim every multiplication table; and 
yet cannot multiply either correctly or quickly. Often, 
he knows the rules of all the arithmetical operations in- 
volved in a problem; but cannot perform them properly. 

In these instances, the idea, though remembered, is 
still in a compartment of the mind, as it were; but it has 
no power to walk up and down the hall and stairways, 
opening doors and shutting them, and really to live. 
The business of the teacher is to help the pupil learn 
so well that he has many important "live ideas." 

Ideas should not be merely "committed to memory," 
— stored like merchandise in boxes. They should not 
be like articles of furniture, however handsome and 
useful in the house, — movable at the will of the house- 
keeper. But they should be like trees in the orchard, 

8 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

fruit-bearing; like flowers in the garden, seed-scatter- 
ing; like animals and birds and fishes, moving and 
alive. 

In respect to an exercise, the learning process em- 
phasizes such different stages as to seem quite different 
from what it is in the case of a study. The first stage 
consists in seeing what is done: or when this is not 
possible, in proceeding step by step according to the 
directions of one who has seen the thing done. In the 
normal instance, however, the learner first observes 
what one who knows how to do the exercise actually 
does. The learner may need to watch the thing as it 
is being done several, even many times, in order to 
acquire a reasonably complete knowledge of what in 
fact the exercise is. 

The next stage is understanding what the exer- 
cise is. 

As in the case of a study, when the pupil, though 
closely observing the exercise, does not understand it, — 
that is, knows too little to interpret or comprehend it, — 
then the subject is beyond him. This, then, is the 
stage for rejection of the exercise, just as it would be 
in the case of a topic in a study. Something else that 
is easier should be taught instead; usually, it should 
be chosen as adapted for teaching in preparation for the 
exercise or study that has proven on trial too hard. 1 

One may understand an exercise without being able 
to explain it in words. One usually does understand 
an exercise when one feels ready or at least willing to 
undertake it. Occasionally, a pupil of undue motor- 
activity is, therefore, unduly confident and undertakes 
what he cannot perform. 

1 See pages 224-228, on the locus of a study or of a topic. 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

The third stage in learning an exercise is remember- 
ing in proper order the steps involved in its process 
and how to take these steps, which is part of under- 
standing it. 

The fourth stage is trying to do it. Then one keeps 
on trying again and again until one succeeds. Actually 
to succeed is the fifth stage. 

In the case of an exercise, the steps in these two 
stages are often many. An exercise is likely to involve 
visible, or at least demonstrable, physical activity. To 
illustrate: — The learner is trying to learn how to paint a 
sunset landscape in water-color. He sees his teacher 
make such a picture, — sees the water, the colors, the 
brush, the paper, the moving hand, the beginning of the 
picture, its development stroke by stroke; at last, the 
sunset is there before him. He thinks this all out and 
comes to understand what was done and how it was 
done. The teacher has paused and stopped. He re- 
members what she has done. He wishes to try to do 
it himself. This is the imitation phase of the process 
of learning. We can and should imitate in respect to 
learning and exercise; but we cannot imitate in respect 
to study. 

We may appear to study, though not studying; but 
we cannot appear to exercise without exercising. 

This is one of several good reasons for putting many 
exercises in our school-courses. They defeat every 
attempt at deceit and prevent the development of in- 
sincerity and hypocrisy. A boy may claim to know 
either a history lesson or an arithmetic rule, without 
being able to put it into words. His teacher cannot 
well prove that he does not know the history topic 

at least in the sense of understanding it; but by giving 

10 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

to him a problem that involves the arithmetic rule, 
the teacher can easily show even to the pupil himself 
whether or not he understands it. 

This may be made plainer by illustration from such 
a manual art as carpentry. A pupil may profess to 
know how to make a true joint: he may even be able 
to tell how to make one. But until he has made one, 
proof of his knowledge is wanting. To make a true 
joint, — as for a picture frame, — involves knowing tools 
and their uses, wood and its use, and the principles of 
lines and angles; and it also involves the power to 
direct and to control the bones and muscles of the 
body, to make arm and hand execute the designs of 
the mind. The directing and controlling of the body 
is a dual process in which both mind and body act, — 
the mind acting in unknown ways through the nerves 
causes movements in the muscles that control sinew, 
tendon, bone, and joint. Technically, the dual process 
is styled " psychophysical" or " physiopsychical." When 
the act is conceived as initiated by the mind and pro- 
ceeding into the body, the term " psychophysical" — 
mind-to-body — is appropriate. When the act is con- 
ceived as due to bodily impulses arousing the mind, the 
term " physiopsy ducal" — body-to-mind — is appropriate. 
The subject in its farther development, however, be- 
longs rather in the field of psychology than in the 
present field of instruction and management. 

When the pupil has passed the stage of successful 
coordination of mind and body so that he can perform 
the exercise, before he knows it in the full sense of 
knowing, he must repeat it again and again until per- 
formance becomes facile, steady, reliable, and at last 

apparently unconscious or automatic. The body now 

n 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

functions in respect to the idea of the exercise. In 
learning an exercise, drill is yet more important than 
in the case of learning a topic in a study. When drill 
has accomplished its perfect work so that the pupil 
always does the exercise well, he has reached the stage 
of genuine skill; and the goal has been attained. In 
this stage, the exercise is a habit, by which the person 
is controlled. 

Whether the matter in hand be a topic in a study 
or an exercise in a craft or art, the stages are these— viz., 
observing, perceiving, understanding, remembering, 
trying to do, succeeding, doing again, repeating, and 
drill. To travel this road under competent direction is 
to learn at school: to travel it without competent di- 
rection is to learn-by-oneself, which is usually too diffi- 
cult to permit one to succeed. 

But in travelling this road, — that is, in learning, — 
not all persons encounter the same difficulties in them- 
selves. On the contrary, each person has his own 
characteristic difficulties in learning. In principle, the 
learning process is always the same; but in the concrete 
instances of the individuals who learn, the process 
takes on individual phases. 

It requires but ordinary observation of men and 
women, of boys and girls, to see that some persons 
learn certain kinds of things easily while others learn 
them with difficulty. It requires but a little keener 
and closer observation to discover that, in many in- 
stances, those who learn some things easily can scarcely 
learn other things at all. Shrewd general students of 
human nature refuse to allow their fellows to be classi- 
fied as "dull," "average," "bright"; or as "slow," 

"average," " quick"; or as "strong," "average," 

12 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

"weak"; or as "clever," "average," "stupid." They 
know that "dullness" in one line is not incompatible 
with "brightness" in another: that the man who is 
stupid in respect to books is often clever with tools. 
Those with scientific minds see that there are certain 
differences of the types of temperament that affect 
vitally the efficiency of individuals, their morals, their 
intelligence, their powers to learn various things. 

There are indeed two distinct kinds of humanity, — 
the motor or active and the sedentary or sessile. Each 
of these two kinds has subdivisions. We have the 
muscular motor and the nervous motor; and we have 
the corpulent sedentary and the reflective or specula- 
tive sedentary. We find these types represented in 
their purity in some individuals and in various com- 
binations in other individuals. We may easily push 
our distinctions to the point of uselessness; even to 
that of absurdity. But for the practical purposes of 
education, we know that the learning process of a 
bright, active, nervous boy does not manifest itself in 
him in the same way when he is learning a geography 
or a Latin lesson as it does when he is learning to draw 
on paper the perspective of a box or to make the box 
out of wood. We know also the learning process of a 
slow, indolent, calm boy manifests itself both in study 
and in exercise differently from the learning process of 
the other kind of boy. We know that in the school 
period prior to fifteen or sixteen years of age these 
differences of temperament make greater differences for 
the teacher than any differences of sex, or of race, or of 
language, or of religion among the pupils. Later, the 
social environment and sex and race-heredity increase 
in relative importance; but no other difference ever 

13 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

transcends in importance the congenital difference in 
temperament. 

The matter can be clearly seen in the examination 
of the whole educational process of which the learning 
process is but a part, though an essential part ; because 
serving as its means. The stages of the educational 
process are four — viz.: 

Motivation, intelligence, efficiency, morality. 

Obviously, for the boy who is born with physical 
strength and energy, it is comparatively easy to ac- 
quire a proper development of motivation and of 
efficiency. Similarly, for the boy who is born with a 
reflective sedentary temperament, it is comparatively 
easy to acquire a proper development of intelligence. 
Also, for the boy born with an easy, joyous, comfort- 
able, complacent temperament, morality (which is 
largely sympathy) is not hard to learn. The nervous 
or ideo-motor boy, who naturally jumps to do things, 
has already come a considerable way up the educational 
road, or rather he can travel it quickly to the point of 
efficiency. But in each instance, the converse is also 
true. The boy with the motor temperament, whether 
muscular or nervous, finds that complete and continued 
inhibition hard in which are developed the power and the 
disposition to consider a matter through to its limits. He 
would rather act than think. This same boy who, once 
having learned the habit of thinking, has then proceeded 
rapidly through the efficiency stage comes to trouble 
again in the field of morality, for he is too aggressive to 
concede freely the rights of others. The complacent, 
corpulent, cheerful boy is weak in motivation and must 
be stimulated right through the educational period be- 
yond the stage of efficiency; yet when efficient, he needs 

14 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

but little training in morals, for he is apt to have much 
consideration for others. The reflective sedentary boy 
is weak in physical motivation, readily becomes intelli- 
gent through information, seldom has been brought to 
real efficiency, and is not likely to care enough for 
others and for human society as a whole ever to be wholly 
and broadly moral. 

These observations acquire patent acceptability when 
we consider that, of the muscular motor, we make 
executives, warriors, farmers, mechanics, rulers, and all 
kinds of men of achievement. Of the nervous motor, 
we make teachers, artists, clerks, tradesmen, secre- 
taries, editors, lawyers, preachers, doctors. Of the cor- 
pulent vital type, we make hotel-keepers, politicians, 
judges, cooks, and all the range of the friends of men. 
And of the speculative thoughtful persons, we make 
poets, philosophers, authors, statesmen, inventors, 
social reformers, impatient with things as they are. 
Or to put the truth exactly, the square-headed and 
square-faced men with the thick, muscular bodies 
naturally become generals, rulers, mechanics, farmers 
and all other kinds of hard physical workers. The 
steam locomotive engineer is always of this type. The 
long-headed, rectangular-faced men naturally become 
masters of the professions, active tradesmen, artists. 
The popular orator in the legislature is usually of this 
type. The round-headed, round-bodied, round-faced 
man who is disposed to sit and think and likewise to 
feel for himself and his fellows becomes, perforce of his 
constitution, the judge of affairs, the provider of good 
things to eat, the "boss" of his ward or town or 
State. The large - headed, triangular - faced, small- 
bodied man dreams of some kind of empire — of the 

15 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

reason perhaps, but sometimes of the world of real- 
ities. 

In the light of these facts of the fundamental con- 
stitutions of men, it is plain that they must differ great- 
ly from one another when they set out of themselves, 
or are set by others, to learning one thing and another 
in school or in the rest of the world of life. One rushes 
eagerly into the task to be learned, but soon wearies, 
while another begins sluggishly and develops strength 
and speed as he goes forward. Such are their birth 
fates. 

Other considerations besides these attend the in- 
quiry into the nature of the learning processes. The 
name of a study conveys but little information as to 
the mode to be followed in learning it. History taught 
by one method and by one set of devices is one thing, 
while history covering the same facts but taught by 
another method with another set of devices is almost 
an entirely different thing. In each case, the pupil 
who successfully learns his lessons learns history, but 
in many aspects his learning process varies as the 
method varies. In truth, he must go through the same 
stages whatever be the method, but the delays at the 
stages vary the character of the learning. One who 
should go from Boston to Los Angeles pausing one day 
in New York, two days in Chicago, three days in Kansas 
City, four days in Denver and five days in San Fran- 
cisco would have a very different report to make from 
that of another who should pause a week at New York, 
a day at Chicago, another week at Kansas City, not at 
all at Denver and a day only at San Francisco. Yet 
each would arrive at Los Angeles with some knowledge 
of the route. In the same way, learning verbatim a 

16 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

good account of the battle of Gettysburg is quite a dif- 
ferent thing from learning it dramatically in a lesson 
in which Seminary Ridge and Cemetery Ridge are 
represented by rows of furniture and the charge of 
Pickett's men acted out by the learners themselves. 
In the first case, one learns the story and how to tell it 
in words. In the second instance, he feels the emotions 
of that great event. The difference is that between 
literary accomplishment and dramatic or practical 
efficiency. It is narrative, even picturing, in words over 
against realization. 

The trend of modern educational method is so strong- 
ly in the direction of learning by doing, whenever such 
a method of learning is feasible, that it is well to see 
clearly that this method amounts to a rediscovery of 
the place of working efficiency among the ideals of 
education. It had long been forgotten from an over- 
care for intelligence alone. We are soon to rediscover 
both personal and social morality as another and yet 
higher ideal. 

It is a singular instance of the richness and of the 
close interweaving of language that while to " learn" 
means to "go over" and "teach" means "show," 
"method" means "main-travelled road." One who 
learns travels by a highway through a region with a 
guide. What the region is depends upon the subject 
to be learned. What the highway is depends partly 
upon the nature of the subject and partly upon the 
skill of the guide. As with the advance of civilization 
in a country, the engineers are ever laying out better 
highroads, so with the advance of culture, the scholars 
and thinkers are ever finding better methods in sciences, 
in arts, in all bodies and systems of knowledge and in 

17 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

all skills and crafts. It is a common philosophical be- 
lief that every science and every art has an inherent 
and essential logic that determines its method. It 
should be the purpose of every scientist, artist and 
philosopher to help find the true method and the 
essential logic of his science or art or philosophy. 
But until these are discovered, practical teachers 
must resort to some common principles of present- 
ing facts and truths. These principles are grouped and 
systematized under such names as " inductive," " de- 
ductive," and " heuristic"; meaning respectively draw- 
ing conclusions from facts gathered, applying generali- 
zations to new facts, and discovering or reviewing both 
facts and generalizations. 1 This is a theme belonging 
specifically to the question of the teaching processes but 
not negligible here in brief notice for one sufficient reason, 
— the learning process controls the teaching process, 
and the learning process traces the method appro- 
priate to the field of the subject, whether study or 
exercise. 

In consequence, the good text-book and the good 
lesson alike are true not only to the subject matter with 
which they are concerned but also to the intellectual 
and other processes involved in learning them. 

The origin of the learning process is motivation. 
Mental motivation is conditioned upon developing more 
energy than is at once consumed in operating the body 
itself, — its food, digestion, metabolism, blood-circulation, 
etc. It is not literally true that the mind cannot work 
in an unhealthy body. But it is literally true that the 
mind operates only when there is surplus energy above 
the constant needs of the body for the maintenance of 

1 See page 36, et sea. 
18 




AN OUT-OF-DOOR KINDERGARTEN. 




fORMAL SCHOOL, SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

its life. With this qualification, one may safely say 
that motivation depends upon health and strength. 

Motivation manifests itself intellectually as curiosity, 
and physically as action, or " restlessness." It is im- 
possible to develop intelligence in one who is without 
curiosity, or efficiency in one who is without activity. 

Interest is curiosity toward some definite end. It 
presupposes some previous knowledge, however slight. 
Purpose is activity toward some end. It presupposes 
previous effort, however slight. Motivation expresses 
itself in its earliest mode as impulse. Its higher modes 
are sentiment, emotion, affection, passion, like and dis- 
like, love and hate. The extent and the force, the fre- 
quency and the continuousness of motivation measure 
accurately the original and primitive educability of the 
individual. These are fundamental matters deep be- 
low temperament, below the psychical faculties of sensa- 
tion, perception, memory, imagination, judgment, fancy, 
reasoning, below psychical rate, psychical field, reten- 
tiveness, and all the other matters into which physio- 
psychology is now making eager inquiries. These are 
the primary matters of power, speed, repetition and 
persistence in the physical constitution of the individual, 
his capital for living. They are deep down below the 
power to learn; they concern the facility and strength 
with which one can pursue the learning process. How 
much, by intelligent purpose when one has arrived at 
knowledge of oneself, one can change these funda- 
mental matters of inheritance is a moot question of the 
practical philosophy of conduct. The soul builds the 
body slowly and can change it but slightly after the 
structure is reared. 

These changes are made, whatever be the tempcra- 
3 19 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

merit, little by little, day by day, year by year, in the 
course of learning one thing and another and another 
through the long period of schooling in civilization. 
The ideo-motor learn to consider and not to act too 
impulsively, the sedentary acquire activity, the muscu- 
lar motor learn, if not to originate ideas, at least to use 
good ones. For the learning process is essentially the 
educative process. Guided, corrected, stimulated, en- 
riched by the true teacher, it broadens and strengthens 
character. In this sense, not what we learn but how 
we learn what we learn is the most important concern 
in our education. Though essential, what we learn is 
secondary and not primary in importance. 

Not to skip any necessary stage in learning any mat- 
ter but to go thoroughly and faithfully, step by step and 
stage by stage over the road is to supplement at least 
in part the natural deficiencies of one's original equip- 
ment for life. 

A native learning process, fairly rational in the be- 
ginning, acquires discipline and proficiency in the very 
business of acquiring knowledge of facts and principles. 
And discipline, which is habituation, is gained through 
marshalling facts and applying principles. 

The habit of learning, which results from the constant 
exercising of the learning process in good school educa- 
tion, is the most important habit that one can form. It 
gives to character patience and diligence in getting facts 
and truths, and likewise in correcting one's own errors. 

In observing the way in which pupils learn, the teacher 
must needs eliminate from his own vision the colors and 
the angles of his own individuality and cleanse him- 
self (or herself) from any notion that conformity to his 

own way of learning would certainly benefit all the 

20 



THE LEARNING PROCESSES 

pupils. What does this pupil most need in order to 
realize the best of his own nature? — should be the 
uppermost question in the teacher's mind. 

There are indeed golden moments of inspiration both 
to teacher and to pupils in school days; but not gold 
but rather hammered and tempered steel is the metal 
by which in this age character may most fitly be stand- 
ardized. Learning all that one needs in this civilization 
is possible to but few. Learning even a little is hot, 
hard, long labor like travelling a road in the sun and 
wind. Easy learning there never was. 

All learning requires, in respect to external informa- 
tion, attention — the holding of the mind to the things 
before the special sense. It requires, in respect to in- 
ternal pictures and notion, concentration, — the holding, 
within the mind, of the things there, about some common 
center. To attend and to concentrate test at once 
intelligence and will, and thereby train them, — literally 
draw them out. 

To know the learning process is to possess the first 
principles of the art of study and of the art of teaching. 

Such is the nature of the human mind that though, 
in one sense, "the only way to learn is to learn one 
thing at a time/' in another sense we cannot learn one 
thing at a time. In learning, one pursues a track for 
a time and wearies. One must then either rest com- 
pletely, as in sleep, or change to the pursuit of some- 
thing else. "One thing at a time" means following 
that road, turning neither to right nor to left until 
weariness sets in or success is achieved. With each 
period of learning, the way up to the limits of what 
has been learned before, grows easier. "A thing is 
never learned by itself" means that one fact helps to 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

interpret another. Apperception is the merger or 
coalescence of one idea with another idea or with a 
notion compounded of other ideas. Mind is a more 
or less organized mass of various bodies of apperceived 
ideas. 

To pursue one thing at a time promotes clearness; 
to associate it with other things, however, promotes 
understanding. To see the fact as it is, — to isolate it 
and to see all around it, — is to conquer and to possess it 
as one's own. To put it into due relations with other 
facts is to use it as a tool for getting, or for understand- 
ing, other facts. 

How we see facts, how we correlate them, how we 
form general notions, how mind grows: these and many 
allied questions belong to the science of mind, which is 
an essential study constantly to be kept fresh by re- 
newed pursuit, — a study not only for teachers but also 
for all others who are engaged in any way in social 
direction or in social control. But intimate psychology 
is not the theme of this book, which proposes not to 
dwell upon the mind of the learner but rather to enter 
upon that other side of the matter of education, the art 
of the teacher in helping the learner. 

For our purposes here, it is sufficient to have in our 

general view the genetic processes by which motivation 

via attention, interest, association and judgment may 

eventuate in reason; by which ideation via functioning 

and habit may develop into character; and obedience 

to persons via obedience to rules, laws and customs may 

become obedience to principles, which is rationality or 

reasonableness. These are processes in which progress 

is easier for some than for others but possible, under 

right guidance, to all originally sound minds. 

22 



"Since the development of the natural gifts of man does 
not take place of itself, all education is an art. Man may 
be either broken in, trained, and mechanically taught, or 
he may be really enlightened." — Immanuel Kant, On 
Pedagogy. 1803. 



CHAPTER II 

THE TEACHING PROCESSES FROM THE POINT OF 
VIEW OF LEARNING 

Helping the learner and transmitting knowledge. — Limitations 
constitute the nature of art. — The general teaching process. — Special 
teaching processes; inductive recitations; deductive lessons; ques- 
tion-ana-answer reviews; study-lessons; drills; laboratory experi- 
ments; lectures; seminars; library- work; translation; tests and 
examinations. 

TEACHING has two purposes, — helping the learner 
for his own sake, and preserving knowledge in the 
world by imparting it to others. To " teach " is to 
"show," to show both "what" and "how." The 
teacher shows the learner the way to arrive at facts or 
principles not yet known by the learner. The teacher 
follows a method or way that he himself has already 
travelled. 

It may serve as a help to a distinct understanding of 
what teaching is to notice what, in certain aspects, four 
other professions are, — medicine, ministry, law, journal- 
ism. These professions, like education, deal with the 
direction, control and correction of persons. One func- 
tion of medicine is curing the sick, sometimes the minds 
of the sick, by caring for their bodies as in the case of 
the insane. One function of the ministry is preaching, 
which literally is "speaking out," "telling" the news or 
the truth or giving advice. One function of the law is 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

making others follow a prescribed track. One function 
of journalism in its largest sense is that of daily pub- 
lishing facts and opinions in the hope and faith that 
ideas, not forces, rule the world. 

Teaching as the fundamental art of civilization par- 
takes of all these functions. Teachers equip physicians 
and surgeons, priests and ministers, lawyers and judges, 
journalists and men of letters, for their work in the 
world, — as they do nearly all other men. The day is 
being approached when teachers will equip women with 
the information requisite for most of their work also. 
The teacher cares for the sick minds of children and 
youth; preaches facts in season and often out of season; 
"lays down the law" in school and college; and tries 
to advance humanity to the age when wisdom and not 
fear of material force will be sovereign, and when per- 
sonal and social conduct will proceed from righteous 
choice and not from external necessity or from caprice. 

The teacher works in these ways to these ends under 
many limitations. Such limitations, however, char- 
acterize every art, and in a sense create the necessity 
for the art. The glory of the art of the violinist con- 
sists partly in the fact that from a small, thin box of 
wood, as a sounding-board for four taut strings vibrated 
by a bow with other taut strings, he is able to draw finer 
music than issues from any other instrument however 
large and complicated. His triumph is that of skill and 
of time, of patience and talent over apparently extreme 
limitations. The artist seems to make his very limita- 
tions contribute to his success; as black heightens white, 
as relief from pain is pleasure, as surrounding poverty 
accentuates in the wealthy their comfort, as the over- 
coming of sin makes the victory of righteousness. The 

26 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

laws of the theme, the versification, the rhythm and the 
rhyme of the sonnet are severe: their severity contrib- 
utes to the joy in a perfect sonnet, such as "Giotto's 
Tower/' by Longfellow. 

The limitations of an art in respect to its medium and 
its tools are its conditions. Among the obvious condi- 
tions of the art of teaching are the respective tempera- 
ments, ages and sexes of teacher and of learner, who 
must be brought into harmonious relations; the nature 
itself of the learning process; the nature of the general 
teaching process, which must fitly parallel the general 
learning process ; the social opinion of parents, of others 
in authority or of influence, and of the community in 
general, which insists upon social indoctrination of the 
learner in certain matters but prohibits his indoctrina- 
tion as to others; the place of the teaching, its time, the 
materials afforded, and the companions, if any, asso- 
ciated as learners. 

The art of class-teaching has yet other and closer 
conditions or restrictions. In consequence, it requires 
finer skill and larger scholarship to be a teacher of a 
class of forty or sixty or perhaps a hundred than to be 
a tutor of an individual learner or of a small group. In 
the large class, there is a variety of persons, who differ 
in temperament in wide extremes and often consider- 
ably in age. Usually, both sexes are represented; and 
in public schools, of whatever grade, all social classes 
and conditions. In cities, the public school attendance 
includes many different nationalities and races, religions 
and languages. In an extreme instance, a class of forty- 
five pupils has been known to include fourteen different 
nationalities, three different races, five different religions, 

and nine different languages. In all instances approxi- 

27 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

mating such extremes as this, the only safety of the 
teacher in instruction and in management consists in 
faithfully observing the general principles of the teach- 
ing process; special variations to suit the few Hun- 
garians or the several Italians or the Russian Jews 
confuse all the others. 

The teacher who would intelligently and successfully 
adapt his or her teaching methods to the class needs 
first of all to understand the characteristics of pupils of 
the ages represented in the class. According as the 
pupils are younger, the element of trying to help the 
learner for his own sake is more important; as they 
are older, the element of meaning to keep knowledge 
alive in the world is more important. In a general way, 
in elementary schools, the first purpose predominates; 
in secondary schools, the purposes are nearer at even 
balance; in the higher education of college and uni- 
versity, the main purpose is to continue science, art, and 
philosophy in the world. 

Some of the errors of teachers proceed from failure 
to observe this clear and simple principle. To illus- 
trate : — In a colored school in Southern Alabama, for an 
hour the teacher struggled with her primary class in an 
effort to teach them the names of the first five books 
of the Bible. It is well worth while to know the names, 
of course; but small children are not the proper field 
for sowing this kind of seed. Again, a faculty of a 
university reversed its policy, and thereafter it granted 
no higher professional degrees in one of its graduate 
schools to industrious but mediocre students, however 
meritorious in character or in effort. It gave as its 
reason the principle that it was considering the welfare 
of the public and the continuance of expert knowledge 

28 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

in the high favor of the public rather than the special 
"good" of its students. In short, it raised its standard 
and reduced the number of its degree-holders, thereby, 
of course, discouraging many ambitious men and wom- 
en, but protecting the public from the deficiencies of 
the relatively incompetent. 

The course of study of a primary school is made as it 
is mainly to help the children forward, to educate them. 
The hundreds of electi ves of the university are offered 
in order that each of these hundreds of bodies of knowl- 
edge may endure in the minds of at least a few men. 
All the subjects of the primary school are offered in 
order to help the boys and girls to succeed in life. Very 
few of the subjects of the university have the personal 
success of the students in view. Personal ambition 
characterizes the younger minds, and the smaller minds; 
social service, art, science, order, patriotism, humanity 
characterize the older and the larger minds. 

The teacher who knows the characteristics of pupils 
of the ages represented in his or her class knows to 
what motives to make his or her appeal. And the first 
principle of the general teaching process is to awaken 
effort, to stimulate motivation in one of its two forms, 
intellectual Guriosity (or " interest") in the case of a 
study and bodily activity in the case of an exercise. 
Arousing the pupiPs own endeavor is the beginning of 
teaching a lesson. Until such endeavor stirs in the 
soul of the learner, the learning process does not be- 
gin. 

In most children under twelve or fourteen years, the 
one generally present motive is to know or to be able 
to do something commonly considered important in the 
over-world of adults. This motive is not always present. 

29 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Obviously, in the motor temperaments, it takes the 
mode of intending to do what the adult can do; in the 
vital sedentary temperament, it takes the mode of in- 
tending to enjoy the affairs of life about as the adult 
enjoys them; in the speculative sedentary tempera- 
ment, it takes the form of intending to know what the 
adult knows. 

In these children under twelve or fourteen, in respect 
to their immediate education, sex is relatively unim- 
portant; and yet, even in childhood, the boy usually 
cares most for the things that interest men, and the 
girl for the things of domestic life. Such interests, how- 
ever, are by no means as marked as they become after 
these ages. To the small children, the ways of adults, 
their actions and concerns seem so great and remote 
and compelling that distinctions between men and 
women are without interest. 

At adolescence, however, especially with girls, the 
forces of sex-heredity set in with vigor; and thereafter 
in the normal instances, to know what men know and 
to do what they can do is a powerful motive with boys ; 
and to know and do what women know and do, with girls. 
In the secondary adolescence of young manhood and 
young womanhood, — when they broaden out and grow 
heavier, — this motive takes on specific forms or follows 
specific modes according to the individual heroes or 
heroines or other ideal persons admired by the young 
man or by the young woman. The young man wishes 
to be a chemist like So-and-so or a surgeon like Some- 
one-else; the young woman has plans to be a social 
leader like So-and-so or an author like her favorite 
Some-one-else. The best of them go about with heads 

full of admiration for statesmen, millionaires, lawyers, 

30 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

inventors; or for matrons, actresses, artists; usually liv- 
ing persons of present great reputation. 

Though age is indeed a decisive factor, it is by no 
means determined by mere count of years. Persons of 
the vital, corpulent temperament are always younger 
for their years than the muscular motor; the muscular 
motor than the ideo-motor; and these than the reflective- 
sedentary. 1 In fact, age is largely a matter of foresight 
and of anxiety, of care and of thoughtfulness. There 
are manly boys and childish men, — and temperament has 
much to do with both kinds. The manly boy has indeed 
something fine about him; though perhaps he loses 
childhood and youth by it. The childish man is saved 
thereby much trouble. But neither type is normal or 
average, though each is doubtless useful, if not for 
example always, at least for warning. 

The competent teacher who has been reading in the 
book of human nature looks for age at physique and ex- 
pression and conduct rather than at the birth certificate; 
and does not try to anticipate the future of the boy or 
girl but to take each as he or she is. 

With endeavor aroused in the learner, the next stage 
in the teaching process is to set forth new facts or prin- 
ciples, not too many or too much, nor yet too few or too 
little, in accordance with the average or a little more 
than the average of the needs, the powers, and the in- 
terests of the learners. To put the principle otherwise, 
in presenting the need it is better to err on the side of 
giving too much than of giving too little. To give too 
little thwarts the best elements in the class, — the bright, 
the strong, the able. It is, of course, a sign of poor 
judgment in a teacher to aim at interesting only the 

Seepages 220, 22X. 
31 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

uppermost third or fourth or tenth in the class. But 
when in a general way, he or she thinks of the class as 
in four ranks of almost equal numbers and aims to in- 
terest and hold the second rank, the teacher has done 
well. In so ranking a class, marks are of but little 
value; for the reason that they include the quantity of 
achievement through a period of time, whereas in giving 
the daily instruction in a subject, the teacher should 
think mainly of the actual working power of the pupils 
before him. 1 Another way of properly adjusting the 
instruction is to think of a normal boy or girl of just 
slightly better than the median quality in the class, and 
then setting out to teach all the class in such a way as 
to meet- his needs, and varying only so much as one 
must in order not entirely to miss any considerable 
number of the others. 

In shaping the instruction at this point to fit the 
learners, free questions and answers between the teacher 
and the pupils are usually helpful. These, however, 
must not proceed to the extent of interrupting the 
orderly presentation of the facts or principles that are 
to be taught. 

The next stage in the general teaching process is to 
find out, in the way appropriate to the study or exercise 
and to the especial matter in hand, whether or not the 
learner remembers what has just been taught. There 
are many devices for doing this, — asking for a direct and 
complete statement in topical form in the case, for 
example, of an informational lesson, and requiring, in 
the case of an exercise, that the learner should proceed 
through it alone. 

Here upon the occasion of defective answers J>y a 

x See page 211, following 

32 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

considerable number of the class, the teacher has a fine 
opportunity to get the echo of his or her own work and 
thereby to check the teaching. It is evidence that the 
new material was badly presented or perhaps was im- 
properly chosen when many learners failed to under- 
stand the lesson, or when some entirely misunderstand 
it, or when, as sometimes happens, they do not remem- 
ber it at all. 

In such cases, it is sometimes well to abandon, for the 
present, that "lead" and to proceed in some other di- 
rection. We do not build a railroad directly in a bee 
line through a mountain chain, but we sent it gradually 
up through tunnels, by bridges across chasms, by spirals 
along the mountain sides, circuitously and subterrane- 
ously, knowing that "the longest way around is often 
the shortest way home." Direct telling is usually poor 
teaching, as the test at this stage often shows in the 
case of young or incompetent teachers. Sometimes, 
at this stage, all that is necessary is a little more ex- 
planation or the presentation of another illustration, 
and then the lesson clears up. 

Beyond this period of the general teaching process is 
the reviewing, the testing, the drilling, and the examin- 
ing, from day to day, later until the matter taught has 
taken its place as a part of the assured mental equip- 
ment of the learner, adding either to his skill or to his 
power to interpret or perhaps to both. What shall be 
done in the way of repeating, or reviewing in larger 
relations, of testing to see whether the matter is 
well and firmly placed and related, and of drilling for 
final security depends mainly upon the special topic 
itself. When the affair is a multiplication table, this 
series of repetitions is prolonged through years. Some- 

33 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

times, it is a concern of but a week or a fortnight. There 
is not much in an elementary school course that de- 
serves being taught at all that does not require at least 
a week's consideration. 

But the discussion of what shall be done in respect 
to these later stages of the general teaching process 
brings the investigator clearly to the point of inquiring 
as to the special teaching processes suitable to the va- 
rious kinds of studies. This is the other element in the 
purpose of teaching that must be regarded even in 
the case of elementary school work and that controls in 
the case of higher education. 

The devices for presenting knowledge to learners, and 
of bringing learners into the presence of the opportuni- 
ties to learn knowledge are many, and their appropriate- 
ness in respect to the various kinds of knowledge, and to 
the various stages of the acquirement of the knowledge 
depends upon some, at times, not easily harmonized 
elements. In a general way, we may say that teaching 
is effected successfully in the recitation class-room, in 
the lecture-hall, in the library through the consultation 
of books, in the laboratory, and upon excursions out- 
doors or by visits to museums, only when four elements 
are properly associated, — the teacher, the learners, the 
subj ect, and the device. To illustrate by the negative : — 
An old experienced teacher with a body of young chil- 
dren is not likely to make much of a success with a 
science lesson in a laboratory. Again: — A young inex- 
perienced teacher is not likely to make much of a success 
with a body of mature graduate students in a political 
science lecture in a university lecture-hall. Again: — 
Even a skilful teacher, forced to teach physics by the 
recitation method in a class-room, cannot make much of 

34 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

a success. There are some subjects that few women 
can teach well to older students, — for example, history, 
physics, higher mathematics, art. There are many sub- 
jects that few men can teach well to young learners; 
indeed, there are but few subjects that they can teach 
well in the lower schools. 

The four places of lesson-giving, — the library with its 
seminar, the laboratory with its experiment tables, the 
class-room with its recitations, and the lecture-hall, — 
afford opportunities for some six different kinds of de- 
vices for imparting knowledge. The method that is to 
be followed controls the devices that are to be used in 
accordance with it. A "device" is a division of the 
highway or method, a section of its road. It is, however, 
important enough to merit some consideration by itself. 

A traveller plans a journey from New York to St. 
Louis; a ticket for the journey by train is one of his 
devices for getting there. He gives to his family, or 
employer, or friends some reason for going, — that 
reason or excuse is a device for getting away and being 
absent for the period of the journey. An artist conceives 
a great picture: — the canvas, the paints, the brushes, the 
studio, the preliminary sketches, the consultations with 
critical friends, the placing of the canvas now in one 
light, now in another, the potboilers painted or drawn 
to get money for living expenses, while the great picture 
is on the easel, are all devices for getting the picture done 
well. 

These words, "method" and "device," should be used 
with care. A recitation is only a device for teaching 
something; and yet the recitation itself has its own true 
method and its own devices for carrying its method out. 
A book is only a device for telling something that the 
4 35 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

author regarded as important enough to write out, and 
the publisher to issue; but the book has some method 
in it, good or bad, and the chapters and paragraphs, in 
form and in content, are the devices for carrying out the 
method of the book. 

When, therefore, one speaks of the "recitation meth- 
od," one has in mind something entirely distinct from 
the method of a subject, such as grammar. But when 
one speaks of "method" in itself, the reference is to the 
general theory of method and not specifically to any one 
subject or to recitations or to study or to lessons or to 
anything else. 

Between method and process, the distinction is this, — 
" method" means " highroad," and " process" means 
"going forward." The former refers primarily to the 
track, the latter to the movement along the track. 
Each implies the other. 

Of the teaching processes, for a period of several 
decades in Europe and America, the recitation has at- 
tracted the most attention and has been given the most 
consideration. The reason therefor is that the recita- 
tion is active and dynamic. Directed study is as much 
a teaching process as is the recitation, and the directed 
exercise is likewise. We lost interest in the latter as 
we converted our school into sedentary, bookish enter- 
prises in the conviction perhaps that to understand life 
is more important than to act in it, and in the knowledge 
certainly that it costs less to maintain schools for the 
study of books than for the acquirement of the manual 
arts and of the technical sciences. The tradition grew 
up that the teacher is a talker rather than an exemplar 
and guide. At any rate, in every science and art, the 
critic, the novice, the narrator and talker about it is 

36 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

much cheaper to employ than the skilled performer. It 
has been absolutely necessary to the development of 
schools, — especially of public schools upon tax-support, 
because taxes as such are always hateful, — to keep the 
costs low. Let us hope that this period of failure to 
understand the investment-values of the public school 
will everywhere at some time pass away. It has already 
passed away in some sections of the country. But let 
us not expect that the investment-value of education 
will soon be understood and admitted as true every- 
where. 

The oral recitation in large classes, following oral in- 
struction, is the cheapest known way of imparting 
knowledge. It saves even the cost of books. 

Of the oral recitation, there is one standard method 
often applied to every kind of subject. It has what are 
known as the "five formal steps." These formal steps 
constitute what is known as "the method of the recita- 
tion." 

The reason for the vogue of this system is that this 
kind of recitation is indeed admirably calculated for 
imparting knowledge in a certain kind of subject. 
Though by no means universally valid and helpful, it is 
necessary in this kind of subject. The whole situation 
by which "the method of the recitation," thus formu- 
lated, has come to be applied to every kind of subject, 
with unfortunate and often absurd results, is but one 
more illustration of the fatuity with which mankind, 
finding a thing "good for something," has assumed that 
it is good for everything. Medicine has constantly to 
fight this tendency. When a remedy has been found 
specific for one disease, it is always in danger of being 

heralded by the many and used by the unscientific for 

37 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

a time as a panacea for all diseases. This tendency is 
indeed the life of the patent medicine trade. Almost 
any medicine whether simple or compounded will cure 
some disease in some person. 

The formal recitation is good for all informational 
studies in the first presentation of new topics. We may 
classify the subject of the whole educational curriculum 
from kindergarten through the professional school into 
studies and exercises, and the studies may again be di- 
vided into logical and informational. An informational 
study is one not yet organized in accordance with an 
inner logic that so controls the material as to make its 
presentation in a certain order of topics necessary. An 
informational study is one, then, that has so far no essen- 
tial method, no special and characteristic process. It 
may be a subject in the course of discovering such an 
inner logic with a typical method for its exposition. In 
fact, its very presence in the school curriculum usually 
implies that it is seeking scientific, or artistic, or philo- 
sophical form; but the informational study is the one 
that has not yet found such form. Nature-study, 
geography, history, spelling, and literature are, in this 
sense, among the informational studies. Many of the 
school and college subjects, however, are in one sense 
studies and in another sense exercises, — as for example, 
spelling, reading, English and other languages. Or to 
put the principle in another way, — in some respects, 
the lessons to be given in some studies should conform 
to the principles applicable to informational studies, in 
other respects to the principles applicable to exercises. 
To illustrate: — We should not teach in the same way 
both an oral lesson in elocutionary reading and an oral 
lesson in the development of the content of that reading. 

38 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

The first step in the method of the informational 
recitation is commonly called "the preparation"; the 
second step, "the presentation"; the third step, "the 
association"; the fourth step, "the generalization," 
and the fifth step "the application." 

In the first step, the teacher suggests matters that 
the pupils already know, arouses in some way of appeal 
or reference to fundamental concerns their active in- 
terest and attention, reviews a recent theme, or other- 
wise tries to get the children or youth into the atmos- 
phere of the subject. This "preparation" may be a 
brief or a long matter, easy and quiet or hard and noisy. 
It is quite useless to try to teach the class until they are 
all in the mood of active attention. Their curiosity 
must be stimulated else they will not try to learn. The 
question as to how brief or how energetic this prepara- 
tion is to be depends partly upon the kind of class that 
the teacher has. Good classes are usually attentive. 
In some poor classes, the effort to get the active atten- 
tion of all is certain to fail: to the extent of its failure, 
this step in the lesson is a failure. 

This step is so important that two thousand years 
ago, Cicero, the Roman orator, dwelt upon it at length 
as a test of the skill of the man before the forum in 
addressing his audience. Indeed, our recitation theory 
is little more than an expansion of his plan for the 
oration. 1 

It is the step in which the known is brought before 
the consciousness of the learner to help him hook upon 
it the new unknown that is to come. 

Illustration: — Topic for the proposed lesson, The 

1 On the Orator, § xxii, "before we enter upon. the main subject, 
the minds of the audience should be conciliated by an exordium." 

39 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Battle of Gettysburg. Preparation: Some other battle 
that the children already have studied. Earlier move- 
ments of the armies upon each side that the pupils 
already know. Hills and low mountains that they 
have seen or at least have read about hitherto. 
Great crowds or other assemblages such as the learners 
have either seen in reality or in pictures. Gunpowder 
explosions. Noise. Bravery and heroism. — Not all 
these points are necessary. It is sufficient to say enough, 
or to ask the learners to tell enough, to make them 
anxious to know more. 

Sometimes to this step is added a so-called "sub- 
step" known as "the aim." Here the teacher tells 
briefly what the aim or purpose of the lesson is. 

The second step is the presentation of the new ma- 
terial. At this point often arises the error of the teacher 
who assigns the lesson in the text-book to be studied 
before giving an oral lesson or holding a recitation upon 
it. To expect a class whose members have already read 
all the text-book account to listen to a presentation of 
the same material upon the plea that it is new and 
therefore answers their curiosity is common enough, but 
it is in direct opposition to the very theory of this kind 
of recitation. 

The reason why this error is so frequently made by 
teachers trained in normal schools is because their train- 
ing is usually designed to fit them for the lower grades 
where few books are used and they are not warned that 
the very use of books to study a new body of material 
makes this kind of recitation inappropriate. In ele- 
mentary grades, books are for study-reviews. 

But assuming that the material is really new, the 
business of the teacher is to tell it with a due emphasis 

40 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

of the salient points and with such questions at times to 
members of the class as assure him that most of them 
are actually following the narrative or exposition. This 
may commonly be made the longest single section of 
the entire recitation or lesson. 

Presentation: — Numbers of men on each side, with 
names of some of the leaders and heroes. The topo- 
graphical facts. The first day's combat. The second 
day's. The third day's. Pickett's charge. The defeat. 
The results on the battle-field. The results in national 
history. The disappointment of the Confederates. The 
elation of the Federals. 

Gettysburg, though not the greatest, one of the critical 
battles of the war. Meaning of a crisis, and explanation 
of the situation. 

In the third stage of the recitation, the teacher makes 
comparisons of the subject matter of the lesson with 
other similar or dissimilar matters, and suggests a few 
pertinent truths drawn from the facts. This step 
emphasizes the lesson by pointing out its meaning. 
Usually, there is but little delay at this point. 

The fourth step offers the generalization. It is often 
but a summary in a sentence or so of the previous steps. 
In some accounts of this method of the recitation, it is 
treated as part of the third step. 

Generalization: — A great battle in a great war tests 
the strength of the civilization and population upon 
each side. The Union army won because it had the 
better position and more soldiers, and because the 
Confederates erred, therefore, in attacking them at 
this time and place. With no greater natural re- 
sources, the free-labor States had so outpointed the 
slave-labor States in wealth and in population as to 

41 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

be able to put and support more soldiers in the field, 
etc., etc. 

The last step is or is not important or long in the 
making, according to the matter in hand. In it, the 
teacher applies the conclusion to practical matters. 
This application must seem to issue from the very proc- 
ess and to be not only logical but moral and ob- 
vious. 

Application: — Sometimes, the crisis comes early and 
sometimes late in a series of events. Sometimes, it con- 
stitutes a climax after which one set of forces collapses. 
Sometimes, as in this case of Gettysburg, even after the 
crisis, the overthrow is long in coming, though scarcely 
avoidable. Indeed, no feature of the Civil War is more 
astonishing than the long and valiant struggle of the 
Confederacy after Vicksburg and Gettysburg, when the 
handwriting of fate appeared so plainly upon the 
wall. 

In this illustrative review of what might be done by 
the formal method in a treatment of this event, many 
points have been omitted. The teacher might have 
compared Gettysburg for likeness and unlikeness with 
Yorktown or Saratoga as a critical affair in a war. 

It is usually difficult to carry out the five steps of the 
lesson as thus outlined in the limited space of time re- 
quired by the crowding of so many subjects into the 
elementary school curriculum and by the fatigue lim- 
its of children. Such a lesson should not be over 
thirty -five minutes in length, and twenty -five is a 
wiser term, even in the last years of the elementary 
school. 

It is evident that such a treatment as that just pre- 
sented is an illustration of the inductive method of 

42 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

teaching. It presents facts and then draws conclu- 
sions. 1 

The opposite or deductive method has its formal steps 
likewise. But curiously enough, there are no books and 
but few essays or articles that deal with it, though his- 
torically it is much the older method and comparatively 
far more often employed. 

The first of the formal steps of the deductive recita- 
tion or lesson is the presentation of the new problem 
to be solved, the question to be answered, or the ex- 
ample to be known. This direct offering of new matter 
is assumed to arouse curiosity and effort, without any 
preliminary stirring up of motivation by formal appeal 
to old interests. 

The second stage is not the presentation of some new 
facts but the offering of some general truth that must 
be learned as a truth and is then available for use as 
a rule or law. Upon the suggestion that this is the 
fourth or generalization stage of the other kind of les- 
son, it becomes apparent that this deductive lesson is 
applicable not to informational but to logical studies. 
In the deductive lesson, one jumps upon the shoulders 
of one's ancestors and sees from that higher view- 
point. 

Illustration: — Six Per Cent. Method in Arithmetic 
to compute all varieties of interest. Presentation: A 
loans B $100 for 60 days at six per cent. How much is 
due when the loan matures? 

Statement of the rule. Interest as a form of per- 
centage. What six per cent, means per day on the 
365-day basis. Its meaning on a 360-day basis. The 

1 For illustrations of the various kinds of lessons, see Appendix 
V, pages 312-321. 

43 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

slight advantage to bankers. The table taught, — for 
year, for 60 days, for 6 days. Computing four per cent., 
seven per cent., etc. 

The third stage is the solution of the problem. The 
fourth stage is drill upon many problems. 

To put the matter more simply. The deductive les- 
son has four steps, — the case in hand, the generalization, 
the application, and drill. Though apparently much 
easier because offering less steps than the inductive les- 
son, it is in reality, in most instances, a more difficult 
method when adequately and successfully followed. 
To teach the rule, or the generalization, as a truth of 
authority, requires an appeal to the memory and to the 
understanding at once, without the aid of the details 
that lend interest to the inductive lesson. 

But it is quite obvious that were all subjects in the 
curriculum to be taught with literal compliance to the 
inductive principle, time would not suffice to cover the 
ground. We must of necessity give many deductive 
lessons. Even in the informational subjects, some topics 
must be studied deductively. Such a document as the 
United States Constitution does not properly come up 
for any inductive study until the later years of the 
higher education. On the other hand, in some of the 
deductive subjects of a logical nature, there are topics 
that may be taken up inductively as lesson material. 
Observational geometry is an effort to convert the logical 
study of geometry into an inductive school subject; 
and it appears certain that for original problems even 
in geometry, and for other problems also, the inductive 
is the true method. 

A third kind of recitation is the so-called "question- 
heuristic" recitation. 
44 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

This kind of recitation assumes that before it there 
has been either a series of other kinds of recitations by 
which the pupils have accumulated information, or else 
that there has been a study lesson by way of prepara- 
tion for the quizzing. 1 

The "question-and-answer" recitation is sometimes 
called "Socratic" from the fact that the ancient philos- 
opher Socrates employed questions so freely in his 
efforts to convince the Athenians from their own mouths 
that they did not know much. A simple, straight- 
forward, methodical series of questions and answers 
serves well for reviews and oral tests. Among the prin- 
ciples governing the heuristic lesson and constituting its 
processes are the following, — viz.: 

1. Open into the subject with questions that have the 
goal in view. To this affirmative principle, there is a nega- 
tive correlate. Do not begin with questions upon topics 
well forward or otherwise within the subject. In other 
words, start with causes; or with the topics earliest in time; 
or with those nearest home. ("Home" is an atmosphere 
due to familiarity and interest.) And yet do not begin 
with narrow questions but with those that have direction 
and point so as to help the pupil to get his bearings. 

2. Proceed with questions that apportion the time duly 
as between the topics, emphasizing those of importance, 
minimizing the relatively unimportant. This principle also 
has its negative correlates. We should not delay too long 
upon any points. We should skip no essential points. 

3. Let the questions follow in logical order. This may be 

1 The heuristic method is employed not only in elementary reci- 
tations for reviewing study lessons but also in higher education for 
the discovery of new truth by the free interpla}'- of the minds of 
teacher and students. The two uses should not be confused. 

45 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

the order of sequence in time or of nearness in space or of 
cause-and-effect or of any other normal association of ideas. 
The correlate of this is: — Do not digress from the main line 
of the review. 

4. Move forward. Do not circle about any topic. Do 
not revive a topic already passed — unless to use it in another 
important connection. (Failure to observe this principle 
has ruined many books, many sermons, many recitations.) 

5. Approach the concluding topics in such a manner as 
to prepare for the ending. The negative correlate of this 
principle is: — Avoid an anti-climax. The last questions 
may be upon the plateau of the conclusion, but they should 
not be so high up that the conclusion itself is a descent. 
The questions toward the end should develop that end 
properly. 

6. End with questions that develop the conclusion fully; 
and stop. There is much in knowing when and how to 
stop so as to make the final impression clear and strong. 

7. Throughout this recitation assume that familiar points, 
once properly set forth, do not need longer consideration 
lest the pupils be wearied. This applies even to the begin- 
ning items, to critical ones in the course of the discussion, 
and to the conclusion itself. 

The order of progress in this question-and-answer 
recitation may be set forth in the simile of a railroad 
trip — viz.: 

1. Direction — start to finish. 

2. Rate — due apportionment of time. 

3. Stations — the essential topics. 

4. Sections — the relations (logic) of the topics. 

5. Regulation of the speed. 

6. Approach to the destination. 

7. Arrival. 

46 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

In all recitations involving questions and answers 
passing between teacher and class, there are some prin- 
ciples that eliminate certain kinds of questions. 

These principles are usually to be observed — viz.: 

The question should not suggest or indicate the answer. 

It should not be a question adequately answered by 
either a "Yes" or a "No." 

It should not be such a question as may be answered by 
a single word. 

It should not be long or involved. 

It should not be obscure in its meaning. 

It should not call for a cut-and-dried answer. 

It should not permit a vague answer. 

It should not be ambiguous or permit an ambiguous 
answer. 

Of the study lesson, much has recently been written, 
and there is much yet to write. The study lesson should 
conform to the learning process. It affords materials 
for the learner to take on as load in the process along 
the method. Books have so long been the common 
reliance of scholars and are used ever more and more, 
and lower and lower down in the grades that how to 
direct the study of books is an essential part of the 
teacher's preparation even for primary work. The as- 
sistance that the book gives to the pupil with mental 
gifts is so great as to enable him to short-circuit the 
elementary school curriculum. It does not, however, 
follow that he should therefore be turned over wholly 
to books. It may be that his mental gifts are likely to 
impoverish his power to do, and to enfeeble his zest in 
life. "Mental gifts" may indeed be only a euphemistic 
blind for a sedentary disposition. 

47 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Most important in the study lesson is that the book or 
text to be studied should be accurate in content; of the 
right tone in spirit, and of a good style. For young 
children to study notes taken down by themselves from 
the teacher's dictation or copied from the blackboard 
is almost to insure their learning words incorrectly 
spelled, sentences incorrectly formed, ideas inadequately 
presented, and a content more or less erroneous. 

Assuming, however, that the material in the book to 
be studied is good, next in importance is the approach 
by the learner to it. This approach is to be directed by 
the teacher, who should give such a lesson upon the 
subject taught in the book as the special topic under 
treatment requires. Simply telling the learners what 
the text contains is not enough. 

The reasons for this necessity of adequately preparing 
the attention of the learner for his study of a text are 
two. One is inherent in the constitution of our nature. 
For the purposes of learning, it is needful to remember 
that men are usually ear-minded and not eye-minded. 
Even now, after some centuries of literacy, nearly all 
persons recall much more fully and accurately what they 
hear than what they read. Words mean far more to 
most persons when spoken than when written or printed. 
If this were not so, the customs of all the social institu- 
tions would long since have been revolutionized. Preach- 
ing would be at an end, teaching, canvassing by sales 
agents, conferences between men, and oratory; and the 
use of the telephone would never have grown beyond 
that of the telegraph. 

Reading the printed or written word doubtless has 
some advantages over speech and hearing. Oral speech 

is like a moving thread or a flowing stream. We must 

48 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

get it when it passes, or we never know it. Written 
language is like a plane fixed in space. When we wish 
to do so, we can review it. Written language is like 
the past, always adamant. Oral speech is like a flower 
that fades. 

We may go over and over the printed page until we 
master it. The page is there to stay as long as its 
paper and ink endure, and as men remember its kind of 
symbols for thought. Even the recollection of speech 
is tricky, and takes on strange varieties of words and of 
meanings. 

By both hearing a matter and reading of it, one cross- 
sections it, and thereby gets it in the solid of three di- 
mensions. But the hearing of it from the lips of a 
competent guide is the true introduction. 

Therefore, prior to setting the learners to the study 
of the printed page, the teacher should outline the topic 
.and explain where the important points are. This 
should be done the more thoroughly according as the 
subject is new or difficult or long, and as the pupils are 
young and ignorant of it and the allied facts and prin- 
ciples. 

The learners do not know how to study. If they did, 
they would scarcely need to go to school. No business 
of a school is more important than this of teaching the 
young and the ignorant how to study. In one aspect, 
a man may be considered educated when, and not be- 
fore, he knows how to study by himself, keeping the 
main trail, — following, despite temptations and would- 
be insistent day-dreams, some approved method. 

Learning how to study means inhibiting the vagaries 
of attention and reflection, — in popular language, shut- 
ting out wayward thoughts, — and keeping resolutely in 

49 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

consideration the topic intended. To do this is a 
triumph of will over the naturally dissipated interests 
and tendencies of the mind. Some individuals can never 
learn how to study, some learn only with difficulty, and 
through the course of many years, some learn by the 
time they are ten or twelve years old, and some are 
natural students, born such by temperament. 

After telling the students what to study, the work of 
the teacher is not over. It is necessary to follow them 
one by one and to see that they are actually studying. 
To "study" is literally to "agonize" over, to work upon, 
to be anxious about. 

To say that there is too much or to say that there is 
too little study in American schools generally is a rather 
unsafe generalization. Perhaps it is true that there is 
rather too much home study required in our elementary 
and high schools; but that there is too little time ar- 
ranged, in the school programs, when at school, for 
the learners to study under direction, is perhaps a safe 
generalization. The truth seems to be that there is alto- 
gether too much undirected study, and somewhat too 
much of misdirected study. Here the failures are of 
individual teachers in respect to their own subjects and 
grades and in respect to their individual pupils. Side 
by side with the teacher who does guide his or her 
pupils in their study lessons will be another who does 
not. 

For the study of the printed page, these principles 
should be inculcated. Some of them are too difficult 
for the smaller pupils of elementary schools; but all of 
them are important in the practice of the teachers of 
all schools in their own study and are available for in- 
culcation in the higher grades of education, viz.: 

50 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

1. Read the passage and get its general meaning. 

2. Read it again and get its exact meaning. 

3. Analyze it in detail. 

4. Go over all doubtful words and phrases (with the 
dictionary, usually). 

5. Add from one's own experience, or from a priori 
opinion, whatever seems to illuminate the meaning. 

6. Read the context before and after the passage. This 
gives orientation. 

7. Get the argument or thought as apart from the words 
and sentences. "Think it over." 

8. Read between the lines. Perhaps or probably, there 
was much in the author's mind that he had neither time nor 
space to say. He expected his readers to supply this. 

9. Now attack or defend the positions asserted in the 
passage. 

10. When the passage is good enough, learn it for ac- 
curate recall. Now, and not before, verbatim memorizing 
may be permitted. 

11. Locate the subject in one's own body of principles 
and form convictions about it. 

12. Express the thought in one's own language and with 
one's own illustrations. 

In this connection, it is highly profitable to note that 
some studies require much more class-exposition and 
much less desk study than do others, and vice versa. 
Any practice of allowing equal amounts of time for desk 
study (or for home study) and for recitation in each 
subject each day is unwarranted by educational theory. 
In general, the studies requiring deductive lessons re- 
quire also more desk and home study than do the in- 
ductive studies, but there are exceptions to. this general 
proposition. The reason is that the logical subject with 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

its deductive lesson represents, in condensed and often 
abstract form, the knowledge and experience or wisdom 
of many minds not verified as yet in the personal experi- 
ence or coming within the personal knowledge of the 
learner, while the inductive lesson is an attempt to bring 
facts and truths within the immediate experience of the 
learner, or in some fields to draw these facts and truths, 
as it were, out from the experience of the learner. 

The subjects of school and college are classified rough- 
ly as studies and as exercises. For the logical studies, 
the deductive lesson with its four steps constitutes the 
true teaching method, while for the informational study 
the inductive lesson with its "five formal steps' 7 is the 
desideratum. 1 The question-and-answer recitation serves 
well for the reviews in all studies, and the study lesson 
"in the book" is calculated to reenforce all kinds of oral 
lessons. We have, therefore, remaining for considera- 
tion the best kinds of lessons for the exercises of the 
curriculum. 

The subjects commonly classed as "exercises" may 
be subdivided into those which are primarily psychical 
and those which are primarily physical, for all are 
physiopsychical (or psychophysical). 2 In the exercises, 
the parallelism of soul and body constantly forces it- 
self upon the attention of the observer. What this con- 
current stream of psychic life and of physical is, no man 
yet knows; and there is no slightest indication that the 
race is getting any nearer the truth for all its searchings 
as the years and the generations pass by. 

1 The deductive lesson is analytic in its nature; the inductive is 
synthetic. Studies and exercises are sometimes classified as sub- 
jective and objective. All school subjects, however, are mainly 
objective. 2 See page 45, above. 

52 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

In these exercises, there are no recitations, 
tation" is a "calling back." A teacher may properly 
be said to "hear" a recitation. But in the exercise there 
is no calling back. The exercise is an individual per- 
formance of the learner, more or less in accordance 
with the instructions of his teacher, but necessarily 
bearing the sole stamp of his own individual powers 
and character. In the recitation, the teacher is the 
interpreter of certain subject-matter. In the exercise, 
the pupil is the interpreter. 

There may indeed be exercises in connection with 
even the most closely reasoned of the logical studies, 
and many are required in the case of inductive in- 
formational studies. But in the subjects that are 
classed as exercises all the progress consists in doing. 

The psychical exercises have one lesson method, and 
the physical exercises another that is somewhat dif- 
ferent. In this respect, however, they differ less than 
do logical and informational studies. 

The point may be best seen in the concrete, which 
is a quality that characterizes all exercises. Music and 
drawing are primarily psychical exercises. Before one 
can draw, one must have some vision of things not yet 
represented. Before one can make any kind of music, 
the tune must be ringing in the soul. And yet, both 
picture and song, in order to be known at all to others, 
must be realized in a thing visible or audible. Manual 
training and physical culture are mainly affairs of the 
physical organism, in which the psychical element is of 
less importance than in the cases of music and painting. 

A true lesson in music is an exemplification by a real 
musician of what the learner is to emulate, together 
with an explanation of the process in detail. To give 

53 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

a good music lesson is to do the exercise oneself well 
for the learner. There is no way to tell about it. He 
must hear the music. Of course, merely giving the 
exercise well is not enough. Then follow the expla- 
nation of the exercise and the trial of the learner 
in it. 

In teaching a study, the person who knows the topic 
may tell something to-day and more to-morrow and so 
gradually build up a body of knowledge in the mind of 
the learner. The first account is but a skeleton of the 
final knowledge. It may not be even that; it may be 
but a little anteroom in the house when it is finished; it 
may be even less, — nothing but scaffolding to come down 
when the structure is reared. 

But in the drawing or music or other psychical exer- 
cise, what is done is permanent. Learning false notes or 
false harmonies at the beginning is a very serious mat- 
ter. They are, in a sense, built into the learner's organ- 
ism. It is undesirable to have a teacher who does not 
teach the facts of history correctly, but the errors are 
remediable later. It is necessary that the teacher of a 
psychical exercise teach correctly, else the subject is 
wholly wrong. The book serves partly to rectify the 
errors of a history lesson by the study review, but 
there is no way to rectify the error of the teacher who 
trains the pupils to a false time motion in music or to 
a false perspective in drawing. 

The steps in a lesson in a psychical exercise are an 
exemplification by the teacher of the new thing to be 
learned, its explanation in detail, its trial by the class, 
the corrections by the teacher, new trials, corrections, 
ad infinitum until by drill the learners are perfect. The 
subject is then incorporated in the makeup of the 

54 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

learner. It becomes to him power and skill for doing 
the next thing, a part of himself. 

When ideas are coalesced in the mind and become 
part of the mind, the power to learn the next thing is 
increased. So the exercise well learned adds to the 
being of the exerciser. Each new song comes a little 
easier. Each new theme for painting well worked out 
makes the next simpler. After a while, the songster 
comes to know music, and the painter to be a picture- 
maker, an artist in form and color. 

But the teaching of an exercise that is primarily 
physical is easier, and the learning of it also. The model 
lesson must still be given, but the explanation may often 
be entirely omitted and direct imitation required. As 
soon as the exercise is known, it may be called for by 
order and commands. We cannot order a child to 
make a painting on demand, but we may order him to 
go through a calisthenic drill on command. In fact, 
implicit obedience and exact performance are among 
the most important educational ends to be served by 
the teaching of physical exercises. Thereby, the body 
is trained promptly to obey the will. 

We have now reached the point of considering the 
method of the laboratory, of the lecture, of the seminar 
and of the library. In the laboratory, one pursues 
scientific truth by the process of observation, experi- 
ment, trial-and-error, generalization, verification and 
conclusion. This is the inductive method in its pure 
and simple form, even simpler than that of the induc- 
tive recitation. A laboratory lesson is indeed an in- 
ductive recitation in which every pupil is instructed by 
himself, and for the time being the class does not exist. 

The lecture is anything whatever that suits the special 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

needs, at the time, of the lecturer as a teacher or teller 
of the facts and principles that he wishes to expound. 
It may be pure narrative, such as belongs in the presen- 
tation stage of an inductive lesson. It may be a body 
of applications. It may be an exposition of some gen- 
eral truth as in the second stage of the deductive lesson. 
The lecture as a teaching device makes an excellent 
summary for reviews in some kinds of subjects in the 
secondary school, and is the typical mode for the uni- 
versity. But the lecture itself has no typical mode. 
The oration is supposed to have its standard form from 
introduction to peroration, but not so with the lecture, 
whose content and special purpose entirely control its 
form. It comes under the head not of pedagogy, nor 
of oratory, but of literature in its broadest sense. 

The lecture should have some inner logic due to its pur- 
pose and subject and should be properly proportioned 
for the occasion. It should aim to create in the listener 
the same mood as that of the lecturer. The lecture is a 
poor instrument whereby to convey facts. The printed 
page is far better. The recitation is best of all. A good 
lecture is an exposition of principles and a work of art. 1 

The seminar likewise, though a practical teaching 
process, in the higher stages of education, is essentially 
a form of conversation, or of conference, and knows no 
other law than that of its specific purpose and subject. 

Sometimes, the teacher of teachers indulges in ad- 
dresses or lectures, and sometimes he organizes seminars, 
for the special study, by proficient members, of some im- 
portant subject more or less closely connected with 
education. It is perhaps permissible, therefore, to 

1 Tolstoi, What Is Art? p. 74. (Johnston, translator.) 
56 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

mention a few features of good lecturing and of well 
sustained seminar work. 

A lecture should seldom overrun the fatigue limits 
of average adults, which are not over an hour except in 
times of high emotional excitement. It should deal with 
but a few main points and those in logical and, if pos- 
sible, climacteric sequence. It should have some variety 
at least of illustration in order to avoid monotony. It 
should be carefully prepared to the least detail, even 
though delivered without manuscript. Not even a school 
superintendent, though burdened with both great and 
petty responsibilities and duties, or a principal, has any 
right to appear before his teachers and improvise. 

The lecture should have one clear conclusion. 

A seminar should consist of but a small number of 
persons who are really interested in the subject, — not 
over a dozen and better but half as many. It should 
meet regularly and at least once a week under condi- 
tions of time and place that guarantee no interruptions. 
It requires both a leader who is a scholar and also work- 
ers who can follow his method and utilize his sugges- 
tions. Attendants who come simply to listen should be 
barred: they may become censorious critics. These are 
suggestions relating only to externals; but for want of 
heeding them, most seminars in and out of universities 
are relatively disappointing. 

A highly developed and notably specialized form of 
lesson is that known as translation. Its process in- 
volves the following steps — viz.: 

1. Study of the passage sentence by sentence, phrase by 
phrase for grammar and meaning of words. 

2. Literal translation into English. 

57 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

3. Smooth translation into idiomatic English. 

4. Giving the translation in class recitation. 

5. Construing and parsing. 

6. Exposition of the author's meaning in content and in 
context. 

In method, this lesson combines features of the study 
lesson with an oral report of it and also features of the 
inductive lesson and even of the scientific labora- 
tory lesson. In practice, because of faulty private 
study, it generally becomes an oral study lesson in which 
the pupils are assisted by the teacher. 

Last is the teaching process that is incidental to 
library work. Here again the method follows closely 
that of the study lesson. It is necessary to add but one 
item — the teacher who directs learners to any kind of 
library should himself or herself actually know reason- 
ably well the material that he or she expects the learner 
to study. Otherwise, the learner is likely to follow 
false leads and to waste time as well as to risk serious 
discouragement, or absolute misinformation. A great 
library is like a great city full of pitfalls as well as of 
palaces. Even a small library is dangerous to ill- 
informed wayfarers. 

The place of tests and examinations in school life can 
be justified only in so far as they are educational in- 
struments; and they should be strictly limited in their 
scope and frequency to this use as educational instru- 
ments. 

A test samples one's knowledge or skill. 

An examination is supposed to exhaust it. 

The test finds out what one knows or can do. 

The examination is supposed to find out what one 

58 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

does not know or cannot do: it reaches to the limits of 
one's knowledge or skill. 

Though tests are usually shorter than examinations, 
the distinction between them does not rest upon this 
fact but upon the difference in their aims. 

The test displays whether or not a pupil has been well 
taught; the examination should display what he needs 
to be taught next. "Test" means "trial"; "examina- 
tion" means "point from." 

There are many familiar objections on physiological 
and psychological grounds to giving tests and examina- 
tions in elementary schools. Pupils fear them. The 
nervous children do badly in them. Failure brings dis- 
couragement and sometimes ill-health; success often de- 
velops undue ambition and unfortunate vanity. It is said 
that in life the daily work rather than the crisis counts. 

And yet tests and examinations continue, despite 
these and many other objections. Like marks, they 
appear to be necessary, though evil. What then should 
educators do? 

First: We should discover the true uses of tests and 
examinations. These are (1) focalizing knowledge or 
skill upon centers; (2) giving the teachers correction- 
points for their guidance in future instruction; 

(3) setting up goals of attainment for the learners; 

(4) eliminating the less necessary and thereby emphasiz- 
ing the essentials. 

Second: We should discard the false uses of tests and 
of examinations. Among these are (1) frightening or 
threatening dullards; (2) stimulating the ambitious; 
(3) glossing over deficiencies in daily work by cramming 
for the written tests; (4) setting up fictitious goals for 
ourselves. 

59 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Third: We should postpone examinations as late in 
the school life of pupils as is reasonable. To be specific : 
— (1) Shall we examine for high school admission? 
(2) How often thereafter? My own opinion is regard- 
ing the first — In good school systems, no. In poor 
ones, yes. As to the second, my opinion is, — In some 
studies, twice a year. In others, not at all. The entire 
matter, however, is one that displays education at the 
limits of exact knowledge based upon scientific investi- 
gation and consideration. 

Fourth: In our elementary schools we should give 
more tests in some subjects than in others; more in 
higher grades than in lower. 

Fifth: In length, neither tests nor examinations should 
transgress the fatigue-limits set by Nature in these off- 
spring of human nature. 1 

Sixth: Every test and examination should be "fair," 
— i. e., should inquire into only those topics which have 
been thoroughly and completely canvassed in the daily 
work whether that be in laboratory or in library, in 
class-room or in study-hall; and the desired answers 
should be only such as were plainly indicated in the 
advance lessons and exercises. The negative correlate 
of this is that the test or examination is no place for 
demanding that the pupil draw some advanced con- 
clusion, see some new point, push forward some hitherto 
unconsidered argument. The test or examination may 
indeed require reasoning but not reasoning upon new 
grounds. It is fear of originals in their strict sense, new 
problems involving new premises, processes and ma- 
terials that in anticipation breaks down our nervous 
youth. In psychological terms, the test or examination 

1 See pages 122, 123. 
60 



THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

may properly call upon memory, judgment, standard 
reasoning but not upon imagination or initiative. The 
only exceptions are examinations for the highest aca- 
demic and professional degrees, by which society needs 
to be protected from such as do not have all their re- 
sources, native and acquired, at prompt command. 

Seventh: Preparation for tests and examinations is no 
fit incentive for the daily work. They must be kept out 
of mind. 

Eighth: Tests should be formal reviews, whether 
written or oral, and should conform to the principles of 
the oral question-and-answer or "heuristic" lesson. 1 

Tests are mile-posts in the process through a subject. 
Examinations determine whether or not the wayfarer has 
reached the destination. It follows, therefore, that only 
a pedant would voluntarily test and examine youth in 
the self-testing and self-examining subjects, in which in 
truth every advance lesson tells any competent observer 
all about the youth's knowledge of and skill in the sub- 
ject to that point. 2 To be specific: There are no 
grounds for testing or examining English composition, 
penmanship, reading, music, or drawing. 

Some subjects require no tests, but do permit ex- 
aminations, because in them every lesson is a test, — as 
arithmetic and grammar, laboratory sciences and semi- 

1 See page 46, above. 

2 1 do not mean to raise here any question about entrance examina- 
tions to higher institutions of learning, i. e., passing from the jurisdic- 
tion of one school to that of another not within the system. I have 
convictions on this point; but they do not concern a text that deals 
with class teaching. I believe heartily in the plan of accrediting 
schools by official visits to and examination of the schools as such 
(not of their product) and of accepting their certificates for the 
graduates. 

61 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



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THE TEACHING PROCESSES 

nar studies. Others require only tests and no examina- 
tion, — as physical culture, carpentry, cookery. And 
still others permit both tests and examinations, — geog- 
raphy, history, literature (historical), translation of 
ancient and foreign literature. 1 Subjects taught by 
lecture methods of necessity require examinations. But 
what the value of either tests or examinations may be 
as educational instruments in the case of the subjects 
taught by laboratory methods, it is difficult to see. In 
these subjects, indeed, it would appear that the examina- 
tions given to the pupils are rather intended as exam- 
inations of the instructors. 

In conclusion, one who duly considers the situation is 
not unlikely to come to the opinion that in graded 
schools, the tests and examinations given by the higher 
authorities to the pupils are essentially devices designed 
to test the teachers and to help grade the classes and 
so to preserve the uniformity of work in the different 
schools. Seldom, I was about to say never, should 
these tests and examinations be entered as part of the 
record of individual students. The teacher's own tests 
and such as have been made and given by higher 
authorities with the teacher's advice and consent may 
be entered as part of the record. 

1 There is no call for examinations or even for tests in the process 
of teaching French, German, Spanish, Italian, or other foreign lan- 
guage conversation. 



"The common school, improved and energized as it can 
easily be, may become the most effective and benignant of 
all the forces of civilization." — Horace Mann, Annual 
Report, State Board of Education, Massachusetts. 1848. 



CHAPTER III 

DEPARTMENT TEACHING — GRADE TEACHING — DIS- 
TRICT SCHOOL TEACHING 

Reasons for the several kinds and grades of schools. — The lower 
limits of department teaching and the upper limits of grade teaching. 
— The several principles of department teaching. — The principles of 
grade teaching. — The causes of the rural school consolidation move- 
ment. — Grading the district school that has but one teacher. — -Ad- 
vantages of such a school. — In all kinds of schools, written work, 
reviews, examinations. — Change and progress. 

A SUBJECT is something put under; in the case of 
teaching, the subject is the material used as the 
means of teaching; in the case of education, the sub- 
ject is the person who is being educated. There are, 
then, two subjects in the school, the things taught, and 
the persons educated. 

The lower the grade of the teaching, the more im- 
portant in the mind of the teacher should be the person 
who is the subject, while the higher the grade of the 
teaching the more important must be the thing that is 
taught. But always the teacher has two subjects, the 
study or exercise and the pupil. 

In elementary schools, the main interest should be in 
the pupils, while in the university graduate and other 
professional schools the main interest should be in the 
subjects of the curriculum. The small child does well 
to cover a page of new material a day. The university 

6 67 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

student may master a serious book a day, or the equiva- 
lent. The small child can master his page only with the 
help of a skilful teacher at every letter. The university 
student is assigned reading passages without comment. 
At five years of age, one does not cover per day one- 
thousandth of the material covered at twenty-one years 
of age. 

Such, at any rate, is the superficial appearance of the 
matter. Upon closer examination, it will be discovered 
that the process of combining sounds with signs with 
ideas and of then transferring the ideas back to signs, 
to sounds, — that is, the organic-psychic process of hear- 
ing, seeing, interpreting, writing and speaking, — this five- 
fold complex of unrelated simple processes, this ration- 
alizing of man through languages, is precisely the most 
difficult of all the things man ever learns, and constitutes 
what is essentially a miracle. The more the thing is 
studied, the more marvellous it is seen to be. Nothing 
that the university man learns is as hard to learn as 
this elementary matter of words. 

In all its varieties of forms and modes, reading is a 
subject so difficult to master that it practically never 
is mastered without much teaching through many 
years. In this large sense, nearly all the time and 
energy of both teacher and pupil in the elementary 
school, and much of the time in the secondary school, 
is spent upon speech, oral and written, — upon words, 
their meaning and use. Not until the later years of the 
secondary school do ideas as such become of the greater 
importance. 

This fact governs the nature of the teaching in the 
different grades of school. In the lowest grades, since 
the content of what is taught is relatively unimport- 

68 



DEPARTMENT TEACHING 

ant, the teacher teaches all subjects. In the middle 
schools, he teaches several subjects. In the college, 
he teaches in a department. In the university, one 
distinct specialty is all that the teacher can ade- 
quately present. 

There are clearly to be discriminated four several kinds 
or modes of teaching, — district school teaching, grade 
teaching, department teaching, special teaching, — and 
there is one other educational line, research work di- 
rected by a specialist, which must be understood as 
coming within the educational purview. Each has its 
own methods. Of these five educational gradations of 
the teaching business, the first three are within the field 
of the present subject. But class instruction and man- 
agement, as usually understood, does not contemplate 
the relations of a specialist with his students, however 
large be their number, and is no part of the problem of 
the director of research work. 

These four several kinds or modes of teaching in- 
volve adaptions of the various kinds of recitations and 
lessons discussed in the preceding chapter. These 
adaptations are required by the conditions of organiza- 
tion in the several kinds of schools and by the kinds of 
learners in attendance. For the reason already stated, 
the first or highest kind of class teaching, that of the 
specialist in college or university, is so entirely depend- 
ent upon the nature of the subject-matter and the 
special conditions of the institution as to be without 
the purview of this book. The question as to how to 
teach a class in the history of English literature of the 
period of Shakespeare is indeed a question of pedagogy; 
so is the question as to how best one may present the 
theory of torts to a law school class. But no treatment 

G9 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

in a general text-book of pedagogy would be sufficiently 
edifying to warrant its appearance. 

The next lower grade of teaching has come to be 
known as " department teaching." We find this in 
colleges, in high schools and academies, and occasionally 
in the upper grades of elementary schools. 

A department teacher is one who shares with several 
other teachers the teaching of several classes and in 
those classes teaches one or more related groups of 
subjects. 

Illustration : — A high school has ten teachers. One has 
both French and German, another the mathematics of the 
higher grades and physics, another the first-year mathe- 
matics, etc. There are six periods a day, and each teacher 
takes five periods a day for teaching. The school may have, 
therefore, fifty recitation and ten study periods daily under 
teachers. When the school has four years of courses, this 
averages twelve classes to a year. Such is department 
teaching. 

Where the teacher meets several different classes 
daily and shares with several other teachers the in- 
struction in the school, but teaches subjects not allied, 
as for example, history and algebra, or English and 
chemistry, there one sees not true department teaching 
but grade or even district school teaching mixed with 
department teaching. 

As an instructor, the first thing for the true depart- 
ment teacher to do is to determine the method of in- 
struction best adapted to bring the subject-matter 
before learners of the ages and qualifications in his 
class within the limits of the inner logic and of the 
special method of his subject. 

70 



DEPARTMENT TEACHING 

Here names are apt to be misleading. " Latin " in 
the first year is not the same kind of subject in respect 
to its method as is Latin of the second year. " English" 
covers many kinds of discipline. German by the in- 
ductive method, German by the conversational method, 
and German by the eclectic method are as different as 
iron ore, pig iron, and steel. Each contains German. 

The second inquiry of the department instructor is 
what time in fact do his students have for out-of-class 
study. The inquiry is not as to what time they ought 
to have. A deal of the bad department teaching springs 
from assumptions and expectations and hopes. This 
out-of-class study should invariably be only the carry- 
ing out of directed plans. The new passage in the 
foreign language should be run over by the teacher 
before it is attacked by the pupil. Assigning lessons that 
are absolutely new is almost research work, required per- 
haps ten years before the pupil has reached the research 
stage of mental power and habit. It is a sure way to 
drive learners out of school and college. But shall the 
learners never undertake new work? Yes, in class, with 
their teacher to guide them. 

It is a safe principle that when the learners have but 
little time for home study, the teacher as far as pos- 
sible shall follow inductive methods of instruction. This 
involves going forward but slowly in the subject. Where 
the time available for home study is large, one may fol- 
low deductive methods more safely. Of course, some 
subjects, and some topics in other subjects, have their 
method virtually prescribed by their very nature, but 
in many instances there is opportunity for choice. 

It is one of the limitations of the department organiza- 
tion of the higher schools of learning that seldom does 

71 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

the teacher of a subject have charge of the study of 
lessons by the learners even during the school study 
periods. It is a common practice of teachers in second- 
ary schools, and often a requirement of the superiors, 
that the entire time of the teaching period be devoted 
to oral or written recitations or other instruction. In 
some subjects, actually more progress will be secured 
by utilizing a portion of even a relatively brief period 
for directed study. This does not amount to an ap- 
proval of what are sometimes denominated as " recita- 
tions with the book open." It means direct study 
under the teacher's guidance. 

A third point that the department teacher needs to 
regard is securing an equitable portion of the time and 
interest of each pupil for his work in comparison with 
the time and interest secured by other teachers for their 
work. This does not necessarily mean that to each 
subject shall be given the same amount of time and 
interest. But all of a student's courses belong within 
the field of his duty, and the boy or youth who learns 
to slight any one of them is learning something that 
goes far to offset the gain made by perhaps greater 
diligence in other lines. Learning to shuffle an obliga- 
tion is wholly unfortunate in its effect upon character. 

This point is a matter for arrangement with the 
superior officers and with one's colleagues as well as a 
requirement to be enforced upon the learners themselves. 

The advantages and disadvantages of department 
teaching are much discussed. In these discussions, one 
essential consideration is often ignored. Department 
teaching is a necessity in the higher stages of the prog- 
ress of the learner in education; and the true question 
is simply at what point to introduce such teaching. 

72 



DEPARTMENT TEACHING 

The necessity for department teaching in the higher 
ranges of education arises from several facts. First, 
no human mind can compass at one time adequately 
and efficiently all the subjects that a class of learners 
should study. Second, as youths grow older, they 
benefit by meeting several different persons as teachers. 
They are brought consequently to several different 
points at which to look out upon and to get their own 
bearings in the world. Third, the subjects of the higher 
education have not only special methods but constantly 
increasing bodies of knowledge and of opinion; and the 
interests of teachers are in these subjects rather than 
in the learners. To give all the subjects that a class 
pursues to one teacher insures a larger interest on the 
part of that teacher in the learners than in the subjects 
taught, which is desirable in the years of elementary 
schooling but not later. Fourth, and not least in im- 
portance. — By giving different classes in the same sub- 
ject to one teacher, the pupils have the advantage of 
studying this same subject for a longer period of time 
with that one teacher than is possible in graded school 
teaching: the teacher may have the class in that sub- 
ject for two or three years. This establishes an educa- 
tional continuum, whereas grade teaching establishes 
an educational socium. True education is like a cloth, 
with warp, woof and nap, and it has both length and 
breadth. 

The extreme views in respect to department teaching 

are, first, that it should begin in the fifth year of school, — 

that is, in the middle of the grammar or elementary 

school course, — and, second, that it should be postponed 

until the third year of the four- year high school course. 

The common practice is to begin the departmental 

73 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

organization of the school with the first year of the 
high school; and the tendency is to introduce such an 
organization now in the last two years of the grammar 
school. 

There is some advocacy of reducing the elementary 
school course to six or seven years and of enlarging the 
secondary school course to six years. When this is done 
either by establishing sub-high schools (or intermediate 
schools) in the place of our present seventh and eighth 
(or eighth and ninth) elementary school grades or by 
transferring these grades bodily to the high schools, 
the question at once arises whether or not to organize 
these pupils by the departmental plan. In the present 
state of pedagogical opinion, the question usually but 
not always is answered affirmatively. 

Grade teaching is such a plan of organizing a school 
that each group of learners, usually about forty in num- 
ber, has one teacher for all subjects. Occasionally, in a 
large school, there is an extra or special teacher for 
drawing or for music or for manual training, who visits 
every class that has the subject and instructs the pupils 
directly and is the only teacher of such subjects. But 
the common plan is to have these extra teachers only 
as supervisors making infrequent visits and instructing 
the class teachers rather than the pupils. 

The necessity for grade teaching arises from the fact 
that in the transition from home and family to school, 
the child suddenly discovers not only the personality of 
another but by reaction the personalities of his mother 
and of himself. In discovering the teacher, he has 
found as it were the solid geometry of the social 
sphere. He learns that teacher and school are not 
in the same plane of life as mother and home. This 

74 



GRADE TEACHING 

is one stage of his self-alienation. He has begun 
to see that life is being, is becoming, is growth. The 
first day at school is almost as important in life as 
marriage. The first year at school is the year of a 
most difficult adjustment. In the kindergarten, there 
is, it is true, usually the assistant kindergartner as well 
as the principal kindergartner, but the kindergarten is 
not a rigid discipline. It is rather a new way of playing 
at life. The first grade is work. To say this is not to 
defend the great difference that now exists between the 
kindergarten and the primary school. It is to explain 
the difference by showing that the kindergarten is much 
like the home, while the grade is not like the home 
at all. 

In consequence, the custom is to give first grade 
children to one teacher who is to study them, to teach 
them in all lines, and to convert them into "scholars." 
Whether the transition from home to school, or even 
from home via kindergarten (where the kindergarten 
exists) to school is ruder than it needs to be; whether 
by a reconstructed class-room, by a differently prepared 
teacher of primary work, by a different course of study, 
some of the best features of the kindergarten regime 
may not be carried over into the years after the learner 
is six years old; and whether then it will not be found 
best to give every class at least two teachers, are all 
questions in the theory of education lying beyond the 
present treatment. We may yet change many things 
in our elementary schools. But until our theory is 
changed and our buildings, normal courses, text-books 
and elementary courses are changed accordingly, the 
one-teacher-per-class will prevail. 

The grade-teaching plan accomplishes certain results. 

75 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

First, the teacher knows what each child is doing in 
each and every subject, and what all the children are 
doing in each subject. There is a double association 
in her own mind. (Nearly all grade teachers are women.) 
She thinks of all the subjects in their relations with one 
another, and she thinks of all her pupils in their relations 
with each subject and with all subjects. The boy who 
is weak in arithmetic is allowed to devote to it a little 
of the time that can be spared perhaps from some sub- 
j ect in which he is strong. A topic may serve more than 
one use, by being brought into relations with several 
subjects. 

To illustrate : — A history topic becomes the material for an 
English composition, and that in turn for a grammar lesson. 
In fact, effective correlation by the pupils can scarcely be 
secured in any other way than by having it first take place 
in the mind of one teacher. 

A second result of good grade teaching is accurate 
grading and classifying of the learners so that pupils 
of about the same age and attainments and powers 
proceed together, with annual or semiannual or even 
more frequent regrading. Such grading and associat- 
ing of pupils with one another is of advantage in that 
for the total number it promotes progress. Where 
associated pupils are very uneven as in the district 
school, the bright young pupils are stimulated by the 
presence of older pupils, but on the other hand these 
latter are discouraged by the superior quickness of the 
younger ones. Good grading as a matter of fact tends, 
at the critical ages of fourteen to sixteen, to hold boys 
and girls in school. A boy who is keeping up well with 
boys of about the same age does not like to fall out 

76 



GRADE TEACHING 

and to go to work. The dullards are the laggards, and 
the laggards usually drop out as soon as the compulsory 
education laws permit. Good grading puts the dullards 
about where they belong with brighter but younger 
pupils. In consequence, they pluck up some courage 
and do not lag so much as they would if overgraded. 
Well graded classes cover more ground than poorly 
graded classes, which is one of the advantages of the 
large school as compared with the small. 

A third result of grade teaching is that the pupils do 
not stay long with any one teacher. This has two 
aspects, one good and two bad. The tendency in the 
graded school is to change the teacher every year or 
every half-year. There is a constant sense of the fact 
that promotion comes soon, and with it the new teacher. 
This saves friction. It promotes ambition. Where a 
pupil does not like a teacher, where the two tempera- 
ments do not work together well, the certainty of change 
before long keeps open the door of hope. But at the 
same time the frequent change breaks some hearts. 
Scarcely do teacher and most of the pupils come thor- 
oughly to know and like one another than the teacher is 
changed. In the second place, the teacher who remains 
in teaching is apt to settle to a routine of the same 
grade or half-grade every year or half-year for many 
years. Instances are not uncommon in the East where 
the teacher has had the same grade and room for twenty- 
five years. In one instance within my knowledge, she 
had the same room and grade for forty years. It can- 
not be successfully argued that such a routine is favor- 
able to the intellectual and emotional life of any person. 
When the teacher has but one subject for that number 
of years in a university, he may become a renowned 

77 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

expert; but the grade teacher not only has too many 
subjects for any such expertness but is required to 
keep too closely to those simple elements which are 
within the comprehension of the pupils to permit her 
to grow freely in the field of even one of those sub- 
jects. 

In grade teaching, the teacher should first inform 
herself thoroughly as to the facts and principles of pri- 
mary importance in each and every subject that she is 
to teach. These do not change much from decade to 
decade, for the course of study in elementary schools is 
now relatively fixed and is made up of universal matters. 
It is not enough to know these well enough to pass a 
graduation examination at a normal school. It is 
requisite to know them so well that nothing whatever 
in the way of class-room incident can drive them out 
of the mind. Teaching with a book in one's hand has 
entirely gone out of schools that to-day are recognized 
as good. The teacher must be an absolutely accurate 
speller, should know perfectly the multiplication and 
denominate number tables, should be thoroughly fa- 
miliar with every line in each day's reading lesson, re- 
quiring no book to verify her recall of its words. The 
teacher who knows is the master, or mistress, of the 
pupils who do not yet know. She should write well, 
sing well, read well, draw well, perform every kind of 
arithmetical computation well, talk exceptionally well 
in sentences of the best construction. She needs to 
know "more than the books" of history and geography. 

It is assumed that it has been a part of her prepara- 
tion as a teacher to learn the key to method in each and 
every elementary school subject. But until she has 
tried these methods herself, she really does not know 



GRADE TEACHING 

them. Those who do not look closely into elementary 
school teaching are apt not to see that there is as 
much difference between the first grade child and the 
fourth grade child as between the college freshman and 
the college senior. The latter difference has been much 
exploited and can be seen from far. The former (and 
to the development of character more important dif- 
ference) has not been much exploited. In the same 
way, we have heard much of methods in college and 
high school science, but in fact methods in primary 
reading and number and geography, Nature-study, 
writing and music, manual training, physical culture, 
hygiene, and ethics, though seldom heard of beyond the 
doors of normal school and teachers' institutes, are as 
debatable, considerable, and critical as are any uni- 
versity methods. 

The teacher needs to know the standard methods, 
the proposed new methods, if any, and the reasons sup- 
porting them. 

To illustrate: — Which should be used, the phonic method 
of teaching to read, or the word-and-idea method, or the 
sentence-and-thought method, or the elocutionary expres- 
sion method, or some eclectic method ? Moreover, one who 
enters seriously upon this inquiry into reading discovers that 
it makes a deal of difference whether he is dealing with 
American children coming from American homes or with 
foreign children of many nationalities in the same room 
or with foreign children of but one or two nationalities. I 
am myself persuaded that the appeal to curiosity with 
phonics minimized is the right way to deal with children 
from English-speaking homes, but that phonics pure and 
simple constitute the true avenue for a class with many 
foreigners of a variety of nationalities. Interesting as this 

79 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

inquiry is upon its f ace, it is not more essentially interesting 
than the inquiry when, how and with what to begin Nature- 
study. 

The university man studies at most four subjects at 
a time with four professors. The primary child studies 
twelve different subjects with but one teacher. There 
is no evidence that in the assessing of the world, the 
former enterprise rates as more important than the 
latter. We may think but we cannot really know 
which takes the more skill or the more consumes the 
energies of the soul. For myself, I hold that we con- 
stantly underestimate the endeavor and the achieve- 
ment of the small child. In consequence, we constantly 
underestimate the endeavor of his mother and of his 
teacher, and their corresponding achievements in bring- 
ing him into knowledge of himself and of the world. 

Not less does the grade teacher need to study the 
natures of children, in particular the natures of the 
children directly before her. She is a working psychol- 
ogist, or else she may be a delayer and a thwarter of 
child-development. To know child-psychology means 
first to know systematic psychology and next racial 
psychology and then genetic psychology and last and 
most the temperaments and other qualities of all the 
different children in her care. Especially where her 
class has in it representatives of many different races 
does the teacher need to know something of race- 
psychology and its underlying somatology. 1 

Wanting such knowledge, the teacher is constantly 
tempted to overrate the importance of ideas, ignoring 

1 See Ripley's Races of Europe, a work of great value to all thought- 
ful teachers. 

80 



DEPARTMENT TEACHING 

the fact that some temperaments are unresponsive to 
ideas and others actually repellent of ideas, ignoring 
also the fact that the temperaments most responsive 
to ideas are the very ones that are least stable and the 
hardest to train to habits. 1 

When now in the light of the foregoing consideration 
of both department and grade teaching, we inquire when 
the former should begin and the latter end, it should be 
apparent that what we need is really a gradual transi- 
tion. If it is best, and probably it is, that the children 
of the first five or six grades should have but one teacher 
at a time, it would appear best to make the next step 
not a sudden jump to four or five different teachers but 
to only two. And I venture the suggestion that a happy 
solution of the problem in large schools is to arrange the 
higher grammar classes in pairs, each pair to two 
teachers, and not to give the first-year high school pupils 
over three different teachers, classifying such pupils in 
trios of classes whenever feasible, three teachers to each 
group of three classes. 

An unusually successful college teacher of biology was 
accustomed to say that the secret of his success was the 
fact that every day throughout his course, he reviewed 
all that his students had previously learned in biology. 
Whatever in this direction may be true of college teach- 
ing, it certainly is true of the best grade teaching that 
it is mainly reviewing, with but slight daily advance 

1 The first educator seriously to see this situation was Roger 
Ascham, tutor of Queen Elizabeth, who in The Scholemaster , 1570, 
wrote with fine discrimination upon this highly important theme. 
He had seen life in a large way and in this posthumous work said, — 
"A wise scholemaster will weigh most what his scholar, whether hard- 
wired or quick-witted, dull and knotty or light and' merry, is likely 
to do hereafter." 

81 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

work. It is also true of most of the good primary in- 
struction that, given a choice of the several methods, — 
inductive, deductive and question - and - answer, — it 
chooses the first rather than the second and the second 
rather than the third. The throne-room of "the five 
formal steps of the recitation" is any primary room, 
and its hall of state the Nature-study or science lesson, 
in kindergarten or any grade, in college or university. 
The laboratory experiment is simply an exaltation of 
the second "step" of the "presentation." The medical 
clinic, likewise. 

For most Americans, for nearly two in three of the 
adults of this generation, the district school has been 
their only educational institution. With the recent 
rapid growth of large cities, of towns and of villages, 
and with the still more recent development of rural 
school consolidation and rural transportation of chil- 
dren from sparsely settled outlying districts to some 
common union school center, it is not true of the boys 
and girls of to-day that two-thirds of them will go, or 
are now going, to the one-teacher school for all their 
education. But at best we shall be fortunate if we can 
soon get one-half of the youth of this land into graded 
schools. 

It is not true that the school of one teacher for all 
pupils and classes is always a poor school and inferior to 
the graded school of two or more classes and teachers. 
But the rule holds that merely to separate the small 
children from the larger and to give one group to one 
teacher and the other to a second teacher makes so 
great a change in conditions as to insure that the 
primary-grammar two-graded school is better than the 
one- teacher graded school. 

82 



DISTRICT TEACHING 

It maybe defective reasoning, and so self-contradictory 
as to be witty; but the truth seems to be that the best 
way to improve a district school is to swallow it up in 
a union graded school. Better always one school of two 
graded rooms with two teachers for any number of 
pupils than any two ungraded schools of the same num- 
ber of pupils, provided the two teachers are the same. 
This problem, however, of consolidating two or five or 
ten small or large one- teacher ungraded district schools 
into some kind of union school belongs to another kind 
of educational book, not to this: it is a problem of 
organization and administration. 

Again to indulge in a remark that is a contradiction 
in terms. — In teaching an ungraded district school, the 
first thing to do is to grade its pupils. What the grad- 
ing shall be depends entirely upon the number and 
proficiency of its pupils. A district school may have 
one pupil, and it may have fifty or a hundred. Schools 
of from seven to twenty learners are frequently main- 
tained. The average age of the attendants may be ten 
years or eight years or twelve years. 

In grading district school pupils, only the important 
logical studies should be considered, — namely, arith- 
metic and English (that is, reading, language and gram- 
mar). As to the number of grades, the numbers of the 
pupils in each grade, and the number of subjects to be 
taught to each grade, it is time wasted to attempt to 
set down rules. A few cautions should, however, be 
observed. 

First, the grades should be as few as is reasonable. 
It is better to have three than five and far better to 
have four than seven. 

Second, the classes should each have as many pupils 

7 83 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

as can be brought together without too great a disparity 
in powers and attainments. 

Third, not over four different subjects should be 
taught in each day's program for one grade. 

Fourth, the recitation periods should be as long as 
they can be made in justice to the total number of 
pupils and to the rights of each. 

To illustrate : — A school of thirty-five pupils, ranging from 
six to fifteen years old and averaging ten years. 1. Make 
four grades, — beginners, high primary, low grammar, and 
graduating class. 2. Here the intermediate classes will 
probably number a dozen each, with half a dozen in the 
lowest and highest grades respectively. 3. Teach one 
program for Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and another 
for Tuesday and Thursday, — exceptions, the beginners 
should have some reading each day; and the highest class, 
some arithmetic. 4. Assuming that each of the four classes 
recites four times each day, in a school day of five and a 
half hours, recitations may average twenty minutes each in 
length; though — 5. — it is better to cut this average to 
fifteen minutes and thereby to secure an hour and a quarter 
for individual help of the students by the teacher. 1 

The teacher of a large district school should be a col- 
lege in himself. (One half of American rural teachers 
are men.) But until he has taught many years, — which 
he is entirely unlikely to do, — it is useless to ask him 
to know his subjects so well that he can teach all grades 
in all subjects with no book open in his hands. The 
nervous fatigue of such a teacher is so great that he 
cannot for many months continuously pursue the course 
of studying late into the night and thereby preparing 

1 See page 132, below. 
84 



DISTRICT TEACHING 

each day's lesson in each subject and correcting all the 
papers of all his classes in out-of-school hours. At best, 
the only fair requirement is to ask him to do all he can 
to master, and to keep fresh his mastery of, his subject- 
matter. 

The rural district school-teacher should desire to 
know the methods of each subject and the devices for 
carrying them out and also the standard primary and 
elementary " general methods/' — but he cannot do so 
much. At best, the only fair requirement is to ask him 
to try to get the best methods in the essential studies. 

Similarly, One might review the other requirements 
of good teaching in the light of the possible accom- 
plishment of the rural teacher; but it is not highly 
profitable to do so. It is well for us diligently to con- 
sider two or three facts, however, before passing from 
this topic. First, the country child has several almost 
measureless advantages over the child of the city: he 
has the opportunity, the necessity and almost the cer- 
tainty, of a sound body. He has, second, a mind not 
overcrowded with sights and sounds and notions, — a 
mind not trained to the dissipation of attention. Third, 
at school, at church or other neighborhood gathering, 
he has but a few persons to learn and understand. 
These he does learn, — as types; and by them he judges 
afterwards all others. Rural isolation may be bad for 
adults; but the world of Nature is the one right world 
for the child. 

The large city graded school and its subsequent high 
school give to the city child an educational opportunity 
compared with which the district school at its worst is 
but a beggar's dole; but they cannot . restore to the 
child his lost out-doors of field, woods, sky, sun, animals, 

85 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

flowers, few and close companions, and the immediate 
practicality of the farm or ranch or plantation. 

There are certain observations that apply, with modi- 
fications, to all these places or kinds of teaching, — to 
secondary school department teaching, to primary or 
elementary school grade teaching, and to district school 
teaching. 

The question is constantly coming up as to what por- 
tion of time should be devoted to written work. It is 
sometimes said that when a poor teacher does not know 
how to discipline a class, he sets them a writing exercise. 
The best educational opinion seems to incline to the 
view that an abundance of written work marks the 
strongest schools and the ablest teachers. In the 
grades where writing should be emphasized, — the drill- 
and-habituation grades from fourth to sixth or seventh 
inclusive, — writing of all kinds of exercises for penman- 
ship, in spelling, in history, geography, arithmetic, com- 
position, and in " memory gems" should occupy half 
of the school day. Writing tends to accuracy, to 
thoroughness, and to closeness of reasoning. All formal 
reviews, most tests, and many recitations should be 
written. Writing covers the ground but slowly, — or it 
covers but little ground. Rather let us say that it 
plants seeds, sprouts, bushes, saplings. When one has 
told something and then has written it out and read it 
aloud, one probably understands it. 

Another question is that regarding the length and the 
frequency of tests, reviews and examinations. The 
fundamental facts of the learning process show that 
every advance lesson should begin as a test and review 
of what is already known. Lest this answer appear to 
be a quibble, let it be said that the frequency of the 



DEPARTMENT TEACHING 

occasions when the entire time of the class should be 
given to all-review work should depend both upon the 
subject and upon the age and grade of the students. 
All-review lessons should come more frequently in in- 
formational than in logical studies and more frequently 
in lower grades than in the higher. To be specific : — An 
all-review lesson in history should come in the seventh- 
year elementary school grade at least every two weeks, 
and in a third-year high school grade, at least every 
four weeks. An all-review lesson in grammar need not 
come so frequently. 

In this same connection, it is asked whether one may 
wisely devote a week or a fortnight to all-review work 
every six weeks or every twelve weeks or only once a 
year, — in preparation for a long examination. The best 
practice reviews the class for a week or so at the be- 
ginning of each term, — say, each half year; but it does 
not require the same length of review for each subject. 
The best practice does not examine pupils, — in the old 
sense of trying in one set, exhausting paper to find out 
both all that they know and all that they do not know, — 
at any period in their course. Despite all the assevera- 
tions of many, a thing of this kind seldom occurs in 
real life. No high school entrance paper should con- 
sume over an hour and a half of the time even of 
slow pupils; and each paper should aim to take less 
than an hour of average pupils. The purpose of an 
entrance test is to sample and to analyze, not to 
exhaust a pupil's knowledge. 

Upon repeated tests of tens of thousands of pupils, I 
have generally found that those who get 90 per cent, 
upon a paper of twenty spelling words get 90 per cent, 
upon one hundred words. Those who get 50 per cent. 

87 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

upon six questions in arithmetic get 50 per cent, 
upon ten questions. Examinations alone should not 
govern high school admission; but daily work and the 
teacher's own estimate of power to go forward should 
be mathematically calculated with the examinations. 

It should be, in every city school system, a standard 
of the class-room teachers' opinions to control and limit 
the authority of the central office that the superintend- 
ent's and supervisors' examinations should never affect 
the pupil's own record on the books but should be 
solely tests of the teacher's proficiency and guides to 
the higher offices in how to help him or her improve as 
a teacher. On the other hand, for such records, the 
teacher should not himself or herself mark his or her 
own pupils' papers. 1 

It is sometimes set up as an argument against depart- 
ment teaching in grammar classes that one poor dis- 
ciplinarian, going to several classes, can spoil the work 
of all the other teachers. The answers are that, as 
stated above, 2 two teachers for two classes make as 
extensive a specializing as sound pedagogy warrants 
and that no poor disciplinarian should survive in any 
kind of school organization, whether department or 
grade. Poor disciplinarians are destroyers (tearers 
down) of children's characters. If department organi- 
zation tends to throw a searchlight upon poor disci- 
plinarians, so much the stronger is its claim upon the 
approval of educators. 

It is sometimes asked whether or not district school 

teaching is harder than elementary grade teaching, and 

grade teaching than high school department teaching, 

and such teaching than the college professor's instruc- 

1 See page 63, above. 2 Page 83. 

88 



DEPARTMENT TEACHING 

tion: if so, why does this mark an ascending scale in 
respect to teachers' salaries, — rural teachers getting the 
least "pay" and professors getting most? The answers 
are several. First, an examination of the statistical 
facts shows that the ascending scale is by no means uni- 
form, — is indeed partly mythical. Second, money is a 
poor and faulty measure of values, — the dollar has no 
standard purchasing power. It buys more in St. Louis 
and Memphis than in New York, more in New York than 
in Denver, far more in rural Vermont or Virginia than 
in rural Ohio or Colorado or Washington. Third, even 
if the scale were a fact, it is still somewhat true that 
the higher the money-return of an employment, — as 
Aristotle said, 1 — the more degrading and unfit to a free- 
man is that employment. In short, wages and com- 
pensation have nothing whatever to do with a man's 
or a woman's value to this world. Many persons get 
too much income to render their best service. Beyond 
a doubt, most teachers are paid far too little; so also 
are many preachers, artists, poets, physicians, inventors, 
authors, statesmen. 

It is often said that the various subjects of the school 
curriculum may be divided into the 

1. New and not generally approved. 

2. New and approved. 

3. Standard. 

4. Old but generally approved. 

5. Old and no longer generally approved. 

1 Politics, Book VIII. Lest it should be said that this opinion is 
valueless because " Aristotle was only a bookish philosopher," I 
venture to recall for consideration here the fact that Aristotle was a 
practical chemist and druggist, keeping a pharmacy in Athens. 

89 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

In this connection, it is profitable to notice that as 
district schools consolidate into union schools, as grade 
teaching gives way to department teaching, as common 
education to grammar school graduation broadens and 
lengthens into universal education to high school gradua- 
tion, the schools discard the old and useless topics and 
subjects, regenerate the standard subjects, and add the 
new and convert them into educational disciplines. In 
other words, the mechanism described in this chapter 
reveals itself as the means by which the spirit of prog- 
ress conquers things as they are and introduces more 
of the things that should be. 



"The curiosity of children is a natural inclination that 
goes out to meet instruction : fail not to take advantage of 
it. Questions are openings that nature offers in order to 
facilitate instruction: express pleasure in them. Answer 
them, and add little comparisons in order to render the 
answers more intelligible. When they express a judgment 
of something without knowing it well, it is needful to em- 
barrass them by some new question, in order to make them 
feel their error, without rudely putting them to confusion. 
Let them see, by some practical mark of esteem, that we 
approve them more when they ask what they do not know 
than when they decide. This is the true means of impart- 
ing to their minds, with politeness, a genuine modesty, and 
a contempt for the wranglings that are so common with 
young people of slight intelligence." — Fenelon, On the 
Education of Girls. 1681. 






CHAPTER IV 

THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER OF THE COURSE 
OF STUDY 

The child's world.— Qualities requisite in the teacher. — A philoso- 
phy of life. — Prevalence of one temperament among teachers. — The 
dominant importance of ideas. — A philosophy of knowledge. — The 
problem of the adjustment of foreigners to Americanism. — The unity 
of mind. — Scholarship and conduct. — Ethical versus materialistic 
views and principles. 

ONE who lives at home, on the street, in the school- 
room, on the playground so intimately with chil- 
dren and youth as to discover what they think, learns 
that to them the school means, first of all, the teacher, 
and next the playmates, then the day's work with its 
studies and exercises, and next the books and education- 
al apparatus, again the supervisors and the principal, 
and last, least, and often scarcely noticed, the books, 
equipment, furniture, and building. In this, the school 
world of the child, the teacher and the playmates are 
far more than all the other facts of the school environ- 
ment together. Often, the school world is of far greater 
interest than the home world: this is commonly true of 
both well-to-do and poor children in cities. The school 
means society and human experience. 

It is difficult indeed for an adult to get back to the 
child's view of that other adult, his teacher. And yet 
until one who would comment upon the teacher does 

93 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

get the child's view, one's comment is certain to miss the 
mark. One may indeed be firing east when the mark is 
north. 

The two worlds of the child, — his home and his school, 
— are not all the worlds of the youth at school and at 
home. The youth has found a third world, — adults. 
The child does not yet know adults. He respects their 
existence, though they are not a part of his life. He 
does not view his mother or his teacher as "grown-ups," 
but as special dispensations of Providence, dowered with 
omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence with ref- 
erence to him and his concerns. They serve him in lieu 
of what later he is likely to know as " conscience." From 
them, he gets both his echoes and his social reactions. 
In this sense, his mother and his teacher are part and 
parcel of himself. 

The persons of a child's society are his companions, 
the other children. The dog and cat are not merely 
" creatures," but a kind of individual, sub-human or 
sub-childish or semi-personal, — as it were, the ghosts or 
shadows or similitudes of persons. 

That is a sad day when the child discovers, — from 
whatever cause or act, — that his mother or his teacher 
is not really "perfect" and worthy of his whole faith. 
It is, of course, a sad day for any one to learn that a 
friend has faults, or makes mistakes, or is guilty of sin. 
These things must come into life, but the longer the 
child lives in the paradise of trustfulness the better. 

It is exactly this attitude of the child toward his 
teacher that condemns at once three several acts that 
are occurring every day in some American school-rooms. 

The faith of the child in the goodness of the teacher 
is rudely broken when that teacher does anything in 

94 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

anger. It condemns public corporal punishment. The 
teacher who goes about rapping the knuckles of children, 
when they do not conform to her notions, sets up fear 
and distrust and disapproval in the souls of all the 
members of her class. The teacher who speaks to any 
pupils in sarcasm or in any other tone than that of good- 
will is a traitor to the republic of children and youth. 
The teacher who reads into the actions of children 
motives of which children are incapable, and who con- 
demns them out of hand, is a public enemy in the way 
to make criminals and social outlaws. 

The faith of the child in the competence of the teacher 
is attacked when a supervisor makes any public criticism 
of that teacher. It does not always follow that the 
teacher herself is damaged in the child's mind, but 
either the teacher or the teacher of teachers, the super- 
visor, is damaged. This affects in the child's mind the 
authority not only of the teacher or supervisor, but of 
the school itself, the social institution in which the 
teacher and the child are living. It is this that renders 
public controversies over the schools so unfortunate. 
The child hears some teacher or teachers attacked, and 
his confidence, which is to him the breath of life, is 
shaken or impaired. 

The faith of the child in the worth of the teacher is 
diminished by every error that she makes or every 
absence of knowledge that she displays unless the 
child, who has his own kind of common sense, sees 
either that the error is trivial or that the kind of knowl- 
edge is beyond the ken of mankind or beyond the child's 
own needs. A fourth grade teacher who makes errors 
in addition or multiplication or spelling causes the child 
to feel that he is walking in quicksand; but the same 

95 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

teacher may admit freely that she does not know, for 
example, the child's native language or why the earth 
does not collide with the sun or who was "the Man with 
the Iron Mask." It greatly impairs the ability of the 
teacher to help the child for her to have a very small 
vocabulary and range of expression. A supervisor is 
likely to notice this; but the child, who does not notice 
it, suffers its results. A deficiency in language power 
deprives one from being intelligible to one's listeners; 
and many a school-room suffers in consequence. The 
child does notice and suffer from loss of confidence in 
the teacher when she uses slang or otherwise offends 
against his preconceived notions of the dignity of the 
teacher. 

Of this natural reverence of the child for the teacher, I 
have observed a significant item of evidence. In several 
cities, it has been the custom of street-boys to "call 
after" the school-teachers. I never knew a case where 
even the rudest of these boys used any opprobrious 
terms when " calling after" teachers whose own language 
and manners in the school-room were pleasant, dignified, 
and judicious. 

At any rate, in all normal instances, the child of the 
primary grades reverences the teacher as an oracle and 
looks upon her teaching as a ministry of grace; the older 
boy or girl of the higher elementary grades respects the 
teacher as a good and wise person, glad to help them. 
With all their sophistication, the youths of the high 
school are apt to be generous in the judgment of their 
teachers, and to err ; if at all, on the side of too great 
admiration for them. All children know that but few 
adults, other than their own parents, care anything 
about them; and most of them are grateful, accordingly. 

96 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

This disposition of the child toward the teacher gives 
to her such power over him as almost to warrant his 
belief in the generous extent and noble quality of her 
greatness, goodness and wisdom. In reference to him, 
the teacher is important beyond the importance of any 
other person at any time in his life excepting only his 
parents and sometimes his wife. Through her eyes, he 
looks out once again upon the heavens and the earth, 
and lo! they are a new heaven and a new earth, and 
former things have passed away. 

To the learner, the teacher interprets knowledge and 
life. She tells him of good and evil. She prescribes 
this and proscribes that. She is often his intellectual 
mother. 

To interpret is to explain, to make plain. Perhaps, 
literally it means "to set the price of" as of merchandise 
passing between seller and buyer. The teacher sets the 
prices upon the various articles of the course of study. 
In the most rigid of city school systems, with their 
elaborate courses of study and syllabuses of planned 
work to carry these courses out, with their principals, 
department heads, specialists, inspectors and board of 
education members, to see that these courses are car- 
ried out, with their pressure of public opinion through 
parents, citizens, taxpayers, newspapers upon teachers 
to do this assigned and expected work, and with their 
teachers almost uniformly prepared, in the same grade, 
at the same period in the term, with the same lesson 
before them, — one set of children will learn one set of 
facts with one body of opinions, and a second set of 
children a second set of facts with a second body of 
opinions, and so on throughout the system in the classes 
of that grade. 

97 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Of course, the varieties of topics that the pupils learn 
are most numerous and extreme in the cases of the 
informational studies, next in the psychological exer- 
cises, next in the logical studies, and least in the physio- 
logical exercises. However hard they might try to do so, 
no two teachers could give the same courses in United 
States History or in English Literature. They could not 
give exactly the same course even in calisthenics. 

What a teacher most of all teaches in the year, more 
or less, of association with his or her students is a 
philosophy of life. It may be a crude, an inconsistent, 
an incomplete philosophy of life: indeed, it probably is. 
The rational and sane human being who is without a 
philosophy of life does not and cannot exist. This 
philosophy of life, so far as it is unconscious, is the re- 
sult of his temperament and issues out of his natural 
reactions from the events of his experience. These 
events of his experience depend in part upon these very 
reactions. An event is a collision of forces. In the 
case of a personal experience, the event consists in the 
collision of the outer forces with the inner. The former 
are not under the control of the individual, the latter 
are the individual's own nature, whether congenital or 
acquired, or in part each. Temperament, then, is one 
factor in the event, and temperament, in the period of 
reflection upon the event, helps produce the philosophy 
of it. But as the event is partly a matter of internal 
forces and partly a matter of external forces, so also 
temperament is not the whole matter of the philosophy 
developed in the period of reflection upon the event. 
There are two other factors. Of these, the first are the 
notions that the individual had accumulated hitherto. 
These notions are partly due to the environment of his 

98 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

life, partly to the original temperament, and partly to 
the original and acquired powers of the individual. 

To interpret the course of study, the teacher needs a 
profound and intimate knowledge both of the society 
from which the pupils spring and of the nature of the 
human mind. We sometimes call these things " soci- 
ology " and " psychology/ ' but these terms do not well 
serve our purpose, for they seem abstract whereas what 
is intended in each respect is entirely concrete. The 
teacher needs to know how people live, the causes of 
prices, wages, rents, interest, taxes, insurance, credit 
and debt, — the curious modern manifestations of tribal, 
clan and family relations, gangs, secret clubs, unions, 
conspiracies, — the history and nature of the farm, the 
factory, the mine, the bank, the store. Seeing these 
facts more and more clearly and largely every day, he 
will see that the child is a product (not wholly with 
verisimilitude to things modern but rather a condensed 
and revised edition) of ancestral lives through untold 
ages, not a resultant compound but a selection of past 
forces. Not less does the teacher who would interpret 
the course of study in terms within the comprehension 
and use of the child investigate and consider the in- 
ternal structure of this heir of the ages. In the child, 
every cell has ancestral memories. Considered as an 
object of study, the child belongs to biology as well as 
to psychology and to physiology. The teacher who 
has not penetrated into that holy of holies of knowledge 
wherein he sees that each human soul is not only a per- 
son and an entity but also an imperfect synthesis of 
partly inharmonious items of mind and matter is a long 
way off from knowing the subject to whom he must 
interpret the course of study. 
8 99 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

The teaching office is a constant command to learn 
yet more and more. 

To say this is not to say that the teacher should de- 
liberately aim at mastering all the knowledge that bears 
upon human problems. Such mastery is hopelessly be- 
yond any modern man or woman. 1 Only through 
thousands of different students can the race now hope 
to keep alive all that men to this time have garnered. 
But the purpose to keep all these fields of knowledge 
within one's general view, to compass them in this sense 
of being alive to their meaning and of being intent to 
use their meaning for educating boys and girls, is within 
the opportunity and is part of the duty of the teacher. 
In other words, it is a part of the profession of the 
teacher to know and to be able to handle freely all 
knowledge of definite value in his school affairs. 

It would be beyond the range of this treatment to 
indulge here in exhaustive reflections upon the differ- 
ences of individuals in temperament, or upon their dif- 
ferences in home environment, in economic condition, in 
social relations, in religion, in all that goes to make up the 
location of one in the world, or upon their differences in 
powers. In respect to the last feature of mankind, all 
attempts at quantitative measurements have failed. We 
know that one has a psychical rate five times as fast as 
another, that one can see three things in a given field, 
while another may see seven, that one person can hear 
ten items consecutively and remember them, and an- 
other hear fifty, that one can retain in the memory with 
great accuracy and fo long periods, while another errs 

1 For a bibliography of knowledge as it concerns teachers, see 
Chancellor's A Theory of Motives, Ideals and Values in Education. 
Appendix. 

100 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

immediately on simple matters, that one person has 
good judgment, another but poor judgment, that one 
strikes often and lightly while another strikes slowly 
and heavily. 

Also, it would be beyond the range of this treatment 
to discuss the differences in the outward social graces, 
in voice, in attentiveness and consideration and kind- 
ness, in taste as to dress, in the thousand and one things 
that go to make up personality. 

These are differences in motives, in ideals, in sense of 
values in life. 

But it is highly appropriate to make a few brief state- 
ments as to some prevailing conditions in our public 
schools. Nearly all teachers, both men and women, 
are of one temperament, either in its simple form or 
mixed or compounded with other temperaments. Nearly 
all are nervous or ideo-motor. Nearly all are quick, 
impulsive, active, eager , industrious, idealistic, ambi- 
tious, conscientious, sentimental, emotional by nature. 
They have inevitably the defects of their qualities. The 
tendency of the quick is to be impatient with the slow, 
of the impulsive, to consider the reflective as cold, of 
the active to underestimate the usefulness of the thought- 
ful, of the eager to assume that their eagerness is always 
a virtue, of the industrious to discount the value of the 
leisurely (and it may be even of the lazy) in the throb- 
bing social life of cities and in the gossip and fret of the 
towns and open country, of the idealistic to miscon- 
ceive the function of the realistic and materialistic, of the 
ambitious to look down upon the contented, of the con- 
scientious to fail to see that the conscience of the motor in- 
dividual is necessarily a different thing from the conscience 

of the sedentary, of the sentimental to fail to consider 

101 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

that the matter-of-fact may really be alive though 
they do not feel quickly, and of the emotional to fail to 
understand the uses of the calm. It is quite beside the 
mark to deplore the situation whereby it has come to 
pass that the schools are monopolized by the men and 
women of motor-efficiency, and nervous motor at that, 
whereas on the whole ours is a muscular-motor people, 
constantly being recruited from the muscular-motor 
peasantry of Europe. All that we can well do in the 
situation is to call attention to two several facts, — 
(1) that no temperament has any monopoly of the vir- 
tues, though each, until corrected, is wont to assume 
that its own qualities are the virtues, and (2) that no 
temperament has any monopoly of ability and capacity, 
though each temperament is wont to assume that its 
powers are those of the highest order. 

It is peculiarly hard for the nervous motor teachers 
of our schools to learn universal sympathy. It is like- 
wise hard for them to learn to acquire the patience that 
gives the "dull" muscular-motor and corpulent- vital 
children time to summon their wits and to answer to the 
best of their ability. Many and many a boy and girl is 
misjudged because the teachers are not wise enough to 
see their fundamental natures. Moreover, these same 
nervous teachers are sometimes impatient with children 
of their own type. It is well for all of us to remember 
that education is in part the thorough and permanent 
acquirement, without hypocrisy, of some virtues of 
temperaments not our own. 

By reason of these nervous temperaments, it follows 
that few of our teachers nourish long and great resent- 
ments, few waste much time, few are cold and distant, 
few are slow and dull, few are unpunctual or dilatory 

102 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

or ineffective, few are victims of any physical vices, few 
are pedants or bookish or out of touch with reality. 
But it is characteristic of this temperament not to 
accumulate great reservoirs of vital reserve, not to be 
well and strong and at ease. The temperament is ex- 
plosive, and easily exploded at that. It is executive 
and not judicial. It is also a law-making temperament 
because to establish laws is thereafter to save thought 
and to permit action. It is also a temperament 
greatly inclined to tradition, for tradition also saves 
thought and permits action. It greatly esteems habit, 
for habit gives freedom. 

Obviously, such a temperament is peculiarly adapted 
to school-teaching. 

When itself tempered by a truly feminine nature, and 
when it characterizes a person of considerable natural 
ability, the ideo-motor temperament helps make the 
ideal primary teacher. The person is vivacious, 
kind, quick, affable, responsive, and has many other 
traits admirably adapting her to care for small chil- 
dren. 

But temperament is by no means all of life and con- 
duct. In a certain sense, the older one gets, and cer- 
tainly the wiser one gets, the more one outgrows one's 
native temperament. Even the limitations of it are 
overcome. Consequently, superficial readers of human 
nature, who profess to know what a person is like as 
soon as they see him, are often greatly misled. In a 
certain sense, ideas are far more important than tem- 
perament, the only qualification being that tempera- 
ment causes one rather persistently to reject opposing 
kinds of ideas. Here we come to one of the more im- 
portant principles of education, that the teacher often 

103 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

should persist in that definite training of a learner which 
he most resists. 

In fact, this is education, — to make to come forth 
from the educatee qualities that are not likely to appear 
but for and because of compulsion. 

The first thing that the teacher is to recognize in 
dealing with younger human beings is that they are 
now to see the world through his eyes. The course of 
study constitutes a panorama of views of the world. 
Its pictures move slowly or rapidly as the teacher moves 
them. The very moods in which the onlookers observe 
the pictures are largely the making of the mover of the 
panorama. These moods are matters of the adjust- 
ments of the various temperaments of the teacher and 
of the pupils. The panorama may move very, very 
slowly, but it cannot stop, and it cannot be reversed, 
for the process of time is irreversibly forward. The rate 
can be greatly varied, or it may be made monotonously 
the same. Some pupils are all the time losing some 
picture of the panorama. None observes them all. To 
announce "Same lesson to-morrow" is only juggling 
with terms, for there are no "same lessons" in life, not 
even in school-life. Even review lessons and tests are 
in part advance work. In them, one sees more of the 
panorama, by climbing higher. Often and often in the 
review, one learns more of what is really to oneself 
new material than in any advance lesson. But what 
one sees is largely what the teacher points out. 

Secondly, in interpreting the course of study, the 
teacher needs constantly to keep in mind the great units 
of the relation of its subject-matter. What the child 
sees are, as it were, disjecta membra, scattered limbs. 
Even in high school and college what the youth sees are 

104 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

but regions of knowledge rather than wholes. These 
relations are not to be taught to the pupils; but they 
must nevertheless not be lost sight of by the teacher, 
for they give coherence and lucidity to his teaching. 

To illustrate: — That interest is but a higher mode of 
percentage, percentage but a mode of fractions, fractions 
a mode of ratio, ratio a mode of division, and division 
a mode of subtraction, which last by paradox is a 
mode of counting or adding the unit, — all this does 
not greatly concern even a bookkeeper in charge of 
accounts and certainly is beyond the needs of the primary 
child; but the teacher needs to see these and even more 
extensive relations of quantity and number in order to 
follow the true order and method and to interpret correctly 
the errors of the learners. In such a subject as history, the 
teacher must know all the great movements in their causes 
and chronology and comparative relations in order not to 
be puzzled himself by the events that he discusses with his 
class. It may indeed be that only a few of the facts thus 
assembled will ever be actually required in his class teach- 
ing, — that the knowledge does not often save him from con- 
fessing ignorance to his young pupils, — but this is not so 
much the principle in issue as that to keep his class in the 
historic track, one must himself know both the track itself 
and its place in universal and comparative history. To be 
specific: We can hardly expect our elementary school 
children to understand the meaning of the slavery question 
as adults understand it ; but the teacher who does not know 
that behind the slavery issue were ages-old ancestral tradi- 
tions of slavery and the primitive dislike of work con- 
fronted by a new social order of free wage-labor and a new 
sense of the dignity of labor as a means of ambition is cer- 
tain to misinterpret much of what both Douglas and Lincoln, 
both Calhoun and the New England poets said about slavery. 

105 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Third, to interpret the course of study, the teacher 
needs a philosophy of knowledge. It is not enough to 
have a philosophy of personal conduct and thorough 
and complete knowledge of the subjects to be taught. 
One requires also an understanding of the relations of 
the great subjects of thought and science to one another. 
That arithmetic is the working tool of all science and 
also of all economic relations among men, that geog- 
raphy explains the physical basis of history and history 
tells the significance of geography, that reading and 
language are the gateways to all human intercourse 
upon the plane of ideas, that biology is the key to 
physiology and physiology the key to psychology and 
psychology in turn the key to philosophy are a few of 
the simplest facts in a philosophy of knowledge. One 
needs never to allude to them in an elementary class- 
room, but one who is constantly in such a class-room 
needs to have a mind that organizes its actual teaching 
output and conducts the discipline of the pupils in the 
light of just these facts. It is quite beyond the range 
of this treatment to present a philosophy of knowledge, 
but it is highly appropriate to say here that one who in- 
tends adequately to interpret the course of study to 
children will constantly throughout life endeavor to 
get clearer and larger views of the interrelations of the 
knowledge-units afforded by the great forms and modes 
of thought, such as time, space, cause-and-effect, rela- 
tion, quality, quantity, force, motion, beauty, necessity, 
duty, and life. To weave together the strands of all the 
class-room activities into the texture of living mind, the 
teacher needs himself to make of the warp, woof and nap 
of his own knowledge a true cloth. 

To promote this harmony of his own powers and to 

106 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

offset some of the disintegrating influences of associa- 
tion with immature minds, the teacher needs to keep 
diligently in the way of association through books with 
the best minds of the race in their products of poetry, 
drama, essay, fiction, science, philosophy, history, and 
in the way of companionship with the ablest adults of 
his community. This is far more necessary for the 
class teacher than for the supervisory officers who are 
one or more removes from direct contact with children. 
In fact, for the supervisory officers, precisely the oppo- 
site caution is necessary, for what they need most is to 
try to get into touch with the children for whom all 
their plans are provided and whose nature they need 
to know and to feel constantly. 

As interpreter of the course of study to young persons, 
the teacher needs to know specifically certain items of 
sufficient importance to be enumerated here. They 
are all involved in the foregoing generalizations; but 
lest they be lost sight of, I enumerate them. Perhaps 
others are of equal importance, but none can be of 
greater importance than some that follow here, or are 
included above. 

First, life is a process, not a status; a flood, not a 
pool. 1 It is in part a physical process, with marked 
stages. It is a process of adjustment of inner forces 
impinging upon and being impinged upon by external 
forces. These inner forces may be considered as the 
heritages from past ancestry. Few of them are in evi- 
dence at birth: they keep coming in every day in later 

1 Nature is being born. Life is growth, — being exists only as 
becoming. Nothing now is, but everything is coining to be.— See 
Weber, History of Philosophy, on Hegel, p. 502. (Thilly, trans- 
lator.) 

107 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

life. This is especially notable at adolescence when in 
four or five cases in twenty the child who has been like 
some maternal (or paternal) ancestor swings across into 
the likeness of a more or less opposite paternal (or in 
the other instance maternal) ancestor. One suspects 
that some lines of cells atrophy while other lines come 
vigorously into action. The outer forces include cli- 
mate, housing, labor, food, clothing, hours and condi- 
tions of sleep, air, bathing, economic ease or anxiety, 
and similar matters. 

Life is mainly a psychical process, likewise with 
marked stages. This also is a process of adjustment of 
inner forces, — aptitudes, dislikes, resistances, — imping- 
ing upon and being impinged upon by external forces. 
Each stage in the adjustment of notions and habits is 
either a victory, a defeat or a compromise between the 
character, — intelligence, efficiency, morality, — of the in- 
dividual and the ideas that came before him. From 
the day of his birth to that of his death, a man is his 
reaction, that is, his temperament. But this " reaction" 
or "temperament' 7 is not a fixed mould but a fluid 
condition. 

Second, each soul is free, to a certain undeniable ex- 
tent. Each soul can withhold its action, can elect to 
do nothing. One cannot create his environment, but 
one can (1) resist it, if need be to death, or (2) reconcile 
oneself to it or (3) do nothing. 

This truth is of the greatest importance in teaching. 
It is the touchstone to test the educability and the 
virtue of the child. The nature of his freedom, — of his 
choice in the presence of opportunity, — constitutes the 
limits of the educability of a pupil. In this sense, 
education is a moral issue rather than intellectual. And 

108 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

the teachers of the world so proclaim it, everywhere 
asserting that industry is more than a substitute for 
talent since industry produces talent. In the sense in 
which teachers use this term "industry," — or its equiva- 
lents in other languages, — it means the free will that 
chooses to undergo pain and fatigue and deprivation of 
ease and of pleasure in order to pursue ideals and to 
effect changes in one's own nature. 

Third, modern society is a vast complex that may 
be analyzed as in part institutional, in part dynamic, 
in part factional and in part individual. The great 
social institutions are property, family, religion, occupa- 
tion, government, education, amusement, charity, busi- 
ness, and war. These institutions are social habits 
affecting the general welfare so strongly as to compel 
the unquestioning support of nearly all individuals. 
The dynamic factors of a modern civilized society are 
its associations and movements, such as parties, causes, 
reforms. Institutions are conservative, movements are 
progressive. Clan and tribal tradition and habits per- 
sist into modern life in many forms and modes — such as 
cliques, conspiracies, secret societies and clubs, the 
factions between parties, the boss and the gang. Lastly, 
we have the individuals, of whom some are blessings to 
community and nation and some are curses. These in- 
dividuals live, work, play, seemingly alone. Some are 
men of genius : some are criminals. 

It is necessary clearly to see that institutions, move- 
ments, factions and individuals cannot all be classed 
as "good" or "bad." In some respects, some of 
them are bad or pernicious, others are good or 
benevolent; and still others apparently are indiffer- 
ent. 

109 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

To illustrate : — It will not serve the cause of historic truth 
or the further progress of the race to assert as many now do 
that "war is evil/' and that "peace is good." War is often 
the price of righting wrongs, — a purification by blood and 
death. Peace nourishes both wheat and tares: a society 
long peaceful is always corrupt and overtolerant of cor- 
ruption. Peace invariably organizes hypocrisy. In a 
world of peace, men become mummers. In a world of war, 
they become frank and real, whereby the sheep's clothing 
is torn from the wolf. And yet war is worse, both peace 
and war being alternately necessary until the end. 
— Daniel ix : 26. 

To illustrate again: — Education is not always the greatest 
of blessings to an individual. (I am using education here 
not in its philosophical sense but popularly.) The actual 
education of many a boy has been a training in the hy- 
pocrisy of assuming a virtue when one has it not. 

We may well note that many social movements are 
retrogressive and calculated to reproduce former condi- 
tions which the society had outgrown. Though the 
proposition is not universally true that revivals of past 
conditions are always unfortunate, the historical ex- 
ceptions are few until the time when a society turns 
down grade and general deterioration has set in. Teach- 
ers as well as all other citizens may wisely view with 
suspicion all social movements whose engineering pro- 
ceeds from persons but recently come from Europe. In 
his transformation into an American citizen, the Hun- 
garian peasant, the German soldier, the French bour- 
geois, and the English mechanic sometimes try to im- 
pose monarchical, feudal or tribal conceptions of class 
and mass upon our democracy. 

To be specific in this connection: Nothing is more 
no 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

important in American life than the independence and 
entire separation of Church and State, government and 
religion. So highly regarded by most Americans is this 
principle that the general tendency in most States is to 
extend it to the independence and separation as far as 
possible of State and School, government and education, 
or more plainly politics and teaching. 

Again to specify: According to modern psychology, 
the mind is one life, manifesting itself in various forms 
and modes, — in "faculties" or facilities, in single actions 
or ideas, judgments, endeavors or in series of actions 
or habits, purposes, intentions, — in other words, in 
functionings either central or peripheral. That mind is 
not yet well-educated which seems to have "compart- 
ments" with no intercommunicating doors, which is 
inconsistent, disorderly, irregular, which does not go 
steadily and gradually toward some goal but flits about 
purposelessly or rushes hither and thither hop-skip-and- 
jump. That teacher does best who takes such a prin- 
ciple as that above regarding the freedom of government 
from ecclesiastical relations and the freedom of religion 
from political relations and uses it judiciously both in 
his history-teaching and in his own conduct toward all 
others including his pupils. Such is the concrete mean- 
ing, — in a single phase, — of the unity of mind. What is 
the value of knowing arithmetic unless one who is 
employed and in good health can keep one's own finan- 
cial affairs solvent? 

The teacher as interpreter of the course of study 
should be an example, a model, an exemplar, both of 
the scholarship implied in the course and of the con- 
duct appropriate in the scholar. To the mind of the 

child, perhaps these two qualities become most evident 

in 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

in two specific phases, — scholarship in the sense of ac- 
curate information in reply to the questions so common 
upon the lips of children, and conduct in the sense of 
fulfilling those duties which are so often the subject of 
a teacher's homilies. 

The teacher who does not know how to answer in 
detail such questions as " I thought that the Mississippi 
was the biggest river in the world, isn't it?"; or "Oh, 
is Longfellow dead! When did he die?"; or "What 
use is this algebra, anyway?"; or "Please tell me the 
meaning of 'feudal'?", — the questions are legion, — not 
only loses an opportunity, occasionally priceless, to feed 
an inquiring mind but loses also some measure, however 
small, of the confidence that every small human being 
instinctively places in the authorities. 

But the ethical aspects of this matter are yet more 

important. We demand of adults certain virtues, many, 

though not all of them, beginning in early childhood. 

The moral growth may perhaps be expressed in these 

stages: — Children obey persons, youth obey maxims, 

young men and women obey principles, and mature men 

reason, in each stage realizing thereby the highest 

morality within their possibilities. When children try 

to obey maxims, they get into just as much trouble as 

when they refuse from whim and caprice to obey the 

direct and specific orders of persons. At the other and 

higher reach of the moral scale, for grown man to apply 

principles rigidly is often to fail of the better morality. 

He must reason and adjust principles to conditions, even 

though to narrower and less experienced men he seems 

to violate some one principle. But is there no highest 

quality that is invariably right? Undoubtedly, but it 

is a quality that is largely rational and not often 

112 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

prescriptive of details, — honor or loyalty. In the con- 
flict of the good qualities, the lower must always give 
place to the higher within the range of the individual's 
age-limitations; and virtue consists not in being good 
but in becoming better. We decry the " school-boy 
honor" that causes him to conceal the derelictions 
of his fellows, because honor in this instance is a 
barrier to the enforcement of special rights. To be 
specific: In my own experience, a high school during 
a session was set on fire by a senior pupil to con- 
ceal the theft of a valuable microscope. It took the 
authorities two weeks to break down in that school the 
silence imposed upon all tongues by " school-boy honor" 
and to discover who set the building on fire, and why. 
The culprit was then placed for a term in an asylum 
for the criminal insane upon the recommendation of 
competent alienists. Of course, with an incendiary 
about, no life was safe in that school. It does not fol- 
low that such honor is invariably to be broken down, 
for it is the "mother" of a later honor that is righteous 
and necessary. 

The great word of morals is "duty," and duty is noth- 
ing but obedience to the authority that the person should 
recognize at his age. The highest duty of the full- 
grown man is to follow his own best judgment, all things 
considered, which literally involves trying to consider 
all things, including whatever may appear to be u the 
will of God." But the highest duty of the small child is 
promptly to do what his mother at home or Ins teacher 
at school orders him to do. 

In the course of study of the elementary school, there 
is one subject greatly concerned with the defining of 
one of man's highest duties, patriotism; and this study 

113 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

is American history. The scorn that men of the genera- 
tion of the Civil War felt for those who stayed at home 
was due to the fact that when the life of one's nation is 
at stake, one has no right to stay at home even to pro- 
vide support for wife and children. To our country and 
its institutions, each one of us owes life itself in the 
literal sense, for our country provides the relations of 
property, business and marriage whence each one of 
us issues. Our country gives us being and maintains 
us. It is our father and our mother. It is a matter 
of duty to the teacher of elementary children in higher 
grades and the high school teacher to teach, and quite 
within the comprehension of such children and youth 
to learn, the meaning of patriotism in times of peace 
and in times of war. One of the great deficiencies of 
the American character is the unwillingness of the so- 
called " better class" of citizens to serve their country 
in public office in times of peace. Such citizens usually 
allege " pressure of private business" or "too great sen- 
sitiveness to criticism," forgetting that salaries of public 
officers should be small, so as to secure the services of 
the unmercenary and patriotic and to exclude others, 
or forgetting that the sense of doing public duty bravely 
is one of the finest qualities of human nature. One 
of the beautiful things about teaching is that it is 
a non-mercenary occupation, providing only a liveli- 
hood and seldom a generous one at that. It may indeed 
be that the teacher is underpaid and should receive a 
more generous living, but no wise man desires to see 
teaching in public schools (or any other office of our 
tlemocracy) an occupation of profit. Upon the lips of 
teachers, therefore, the inculcation of the duty of un- 
selfish patriotism is appropriate. 

114 



THE TEACHER AS INTERPRETER 

Since the teacher is conspicuously the person who 
teaches and practices in a democracy, — side by side with 
the soldier, the policeman, the fireman, and the govern- 
ment clerk, — the quieter duties of patriotism, it is proper 
for him to consider the question of the relation of the 
individual to the secret societies, the factions and clans 
that persist into modern life. These concern women 
but little, though they concern men greatly. Only the 
Chinese Empire has more of this secret and factional 
life than has the American Republic. Strong central 
governments never tolerate such organizations freely. 
The peace of the past forty-five years has permitted the 
multiplication of all these kinds of societies. Whether 
or not they tend to the more liberal humanity that is 
the order of the time to come must, in each instance, be 
inquired into as a matter of fact, but so much as this 
the teacher should inculcate and exemplify that he 
should encourage only such secret clubs and divisive 
factions as he believes surely help forward the general 
welfare. 

There is a fine materialism, elegant and often fascinat- 
ing, that is just as dangerous to the best life of the 
teacher as is the gross materialism that is so plain in 
most of the affairs and concerns of our present stupen- 
dous civilization. The delightful materialism, on its 
surface, appears conducive to the best interests of the 
spirit. It draws attention to the machinery of educa- 
tion, — to finer buildings and more commodious, to larger 
salaries and to better tenure of office, to more artistic 
methods of teaching, to travel and to culture; and it 
says, — Seek these things; for when you have them, you 
will be able to do better work as teachers,, for you will 
be happier, wiser and healthier. And when we have 

9 115 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

them, so we will, so we will, if — if we do not seek them 
at all. For the words of Jesus are literally true, "Seek 
ye first the kingdom of heaven and its righteousness, and 
all these things will be added unto you." It is literally 
not worth while to have them, — they will be but vexa- 
tion of spirit, — until they have come as results of seek- 
ing things that are in themselves worth while, — peace 
and truth and order and aspiration, the approval of the 
best, for a daily life of patience, moderation, industry, 
and interest in the welfare of others. 

A course of study is essentially a spiritual thing: it 
is concerned with a man's inner and real life. Between 
the man who knows such an inner life — who is religious 
— and the man who cares for the outer life — who is 
materialistic — there has been and forever will be war. 
Both men fight within nearly every one of us. In this 
sense, that teacher is a true interpreter of the course of 
study, who lives in such fashion and speaks in such 
language that all men and all children see that he knows 
upon which side ultimately and of right the battle always 
goes. For in the dialectic of history, the nation of ideas, 
the religious people always wins fairly enough to trans- 
mit its ideas to the civilization that lies ahead. And in 
the dialectic of individual lives, the final victory, the 
ultimate triumph necessarily rests with that man in us 
who knows that "the price of wisdom is above rubies" 
and therefore gets wisdom as the principal thing to be 
had of life. 



a 



A certain order, then, proper to each, becoming in- 
herent in each, makes each thing good." — Plato, Gorgias, 
§ 133. 380 b.c. 



CHAPTER V 

THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

The variety of duties. — -Frictions. — ;Daily preparation. — Daily 
programs in a graded elementary school. — High school programs. — 
Advance plans versus records of accomplishment. — A new class. 

THERE is a deal of difference in the kind and in the 
quality of the work that different teachers must 
perform every day of their lives. One teacher has 
twenty small children for three or four hours a day. 
Another has half a thousand in the course of a week, 
holding with them in class sessions of half an hour each 
for two or three times during the week but teaching 
each day six or seven hours. I have seen even greater 
extremes. 

One teacher meets his pupils in a log-cabin with log- 
furniture; another meets his in a pressed-brick palace 
with the latest adjustable desks for furniture. 

One high school may have seventy-five teachers for 
seven hundred and fifty pupils, while another has but 
thirty-five for eleven hundred pupils. 

These instances suffice to show that in the conditions 
and circumstances of their work, teachers differ too 
much to make closely prescriptive directions profitable. 

But regarding all teachers a few facts may be as- 
sumed. 

Of these, the first is that whatever be the number or 

119 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

grade of their pupils, and whatever the conditions and 
surroundings of their work, the teacher has all that he 
can do. For this, there are two reasons: First, the 
employers of teachers are seldom so careless of the ex- 
tent of the duties of their employes as to allow them 
a relaxing and disintegrating amount of leisure. Second, 
it requires but two or three boys or girls to open up 
opportunities for thought, endeavor and anxiety enough 
to keep an intelligent adult constantly busy in caring 
for them. The average American city school teacher 
has for employers principal, supervisors, superintend- 
ent, board of education members, perhaps other public 
governing officers, taxpayers, citizens and parents and 
as a class some forty pupils. The case of the American 
district school teacher is different but not easier. Like- 
wise, the teacher in the parochial or other private school 
is working under conditions that tax strength and 
ability to their limits. 

A second fact that may be assumed is that a large 
amount of the hard work that the average teacher per- 
forms daily is the result of friction in relation to the 
task. Every change that reduces the friction eases the 
amount of hard work. 

To illustrate : — It is easier to work under an agreeable but 
not omnipresent principal than to work under other kinds. 
It is easier to work in a well-lighted, well-ventilated, prop- 
erly heated, large, clean, commodious room than in one that 
fails in these particulars. Of all the advantages and quali- 
fications that a teacher can have for his daily task, these are 
the greatest: — 1st, adequate financial return; 2d, security 
of tenure; 3d, health; 4th, strength; 5th, general intellect- 
ual preparation for teaching; and 6th, adequate daily prep- 
aration before entering the class-room. These advantages 

120 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

are of extremely complicated relationships with one another. 
The teacher who lasts in teaching twenty-five years is en- 
tirely familiar with these relationships. Yet not more than 
one of them has been measurably within his or her personal 
control — the last. Most teachers can in a degree control 
the extent of the daily preparation of their lessons. There 
are no successful teachers of twenty-five years' experience 
who have not felt some interest constantly in, and have not 
given some time regularly to, the daily preparation of the 
class lessons. The degree in which a teacher prepares his 
daily lessons depends in part upon his health and strength, 
in part upon the number of hours given to actual teaching, 
but in the main to his own conception of the importance of 
the teaching function. One who cares about the lessons 
next to be given thinks about them when going to school 
and at many other apparently care-free times of the day. 
The extent of the teacher's daily preparation is less within 
his control; and yet even the teacher whose school lasts 
seven or eight hours a day can usually get one or two hours 
for preparation, when he so wills, desires, and intends. 

A third fact may be assumed as true of all teachers, — 
they teach because they are interested in the work. 
There are some exceptions, perhaps a considerable pro- 
portion among the older teachers; but taking the entire 
half million men and women, one can find no other 
profession with so small a number relatively who work 
neither for money nor for fame, neither for livelihood 
nor for respectable employment. To teach is a very 
natural human function, requiring but little stimulus 
for its awakening in most hearts. Because of this fact 
that most teachers enjoy doing the work, they are 
usually ready and indeed in many instances eager for 

suggestions. Most of the exceptions are in those cities 

121 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

where they have been badly managed by disloyal 
boards of education or by incompetent and perhaps 
tyrannical superintendents. 

From these facts, it follows, first, that to ease the 
work in their class-rooms, teachers should prepare them- 
selves immediately and in detail before entering upon 
the day's duties; second, to go on improving year after 
year and to be happy in their work, they should make 
such daily preparation; and, third, that making such 
preparation is evidence of fitness for and happiness 
in teaching. And the corresponding negatives are all 
true: — not to prepare each day's lessons properly is to 
make the day's work hard; not to prepare them regu- 
larly year after year — to live by the old note-books — is 
to insure both intellectual stagnation or worse, and also 
esthetic distaste for the tasks of education; and not to 
prepare is evidence of unfitness for, and unhappiness in, 
the work. What and whom we love, we labor for and 
gladly serve. Thereby, we grow. 

In preparation for the day's duties, the first move is 
to make a general daily program. When that is already 
provided by others in authority, the first move is to 
make the special daily program. 

The principles that should govern the making of the 
daily program are as follows — viz.: 

1. Before school, get materials ready, see individual 
pupils, confer with school heads and colleagues. 

2. By morning exercises in music, ethical lesson, story- 
telling, and literary or elocutionary class or individual 
features, bring the pupils into harmony with the school 
atmosphere. 

3. Because we have many fatigue rhythms or natural 

122 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

bodily periodicities, the child under ten should seldom be 
held to lessons over 15-20 minutes in length; 

4. And the hardest work should come earliest in the 
morning. 

5. Hard and easy subjects should alternate. 

6. Such exercises as spelling, writing, and calisthenics 
should not be over ten minutes in length because of special 
difficulties, — respectively, confusion of ideas, special mus- 
cular fatigue, and widely extended physical excitation. 

7. Children need a mid-morning, spontaneous, care-free 
period, best secured by a recess not too long nor too closely 
supervised. 

8. End each session with study period or manual work. 

9. Where the curriculum is crowded, teach informa- 
tional studies and physiological or psychological exercises 
but two or three days each week, using one program for 
Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and another for Tuesday 
and Thursday. 

10. Teach a subject always at the same hour of the day, 
if at all. Expectation and functioning depend upon reg- 
ular periodical rhythms. 

11. Since teachers differ in psychical rate and otherwise, 
they should have freedom within limits to lengthen or 
shorten the periods devoted to the various subjects. 

12. The easiest lessons should be assigned for Mondays 
and Fridays. 

General Note. — For a discussion as to whether or not 
to divide a third-year class into two sections (say) A and B, 
or 1st and 2d, see Chapter VII following. When two sec- 
tions or three or four groups are formed, it becomes requisite 
to prepare the special day's program in much detail. 

123 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



I. THIRD YEAR AT SCHOOL 



General Daily Program 
a.m. 

9.00- 9.15 Morning exercises 

9.15- 9.35 Arithmetic 

9.35- 9.50 Writing 

9.50-10.10 Nature-study 1 

A.M. 

10.10-10.30 Language 

10.30-10.45 Recess 2 

10.45-11.05 Reading 

11.05-11.15 Spelling 

11.15-11.45 Manual work 

P.M. 

1.15- 1.30 Music 

1.30- 1.45 Oral arithmetic 

1.45- 1.55 Calisthenics 

1.55- 2.05 Memory selection 

2.05- 2.15 Recess 

2.15- 2.35 Drawing 

2.35- 3.00 Study 



Special Day's Program, Oct. 1 

St. Luke vi : 27-38 (1) 

"9" Table, written problems (2) 

mnmnmn 

Squirrels 

Statements about autumn 

H 's Third, p. 18 

(3) 

Finish raffia basket 

New rote song: "Dance of the 

Leaves" 
Fund, operns. sm. numbers 
Supervisor's day 
Bryant's "A Forest Hymn," 

5 lines (4) 

Squirrels (5) 

Help S. G. with arithmetic (6) 



1 Preferably each class-room, certainly each school-house should 
have a Nature library, with well-illustrated books. There should 
also be a museum, however small at the beginning. Some of the 
books and materials should be for the teacher, but most of them 
should be selected for the uses of the pupils themselves. There 
should also be lantern slides and stereoscope views. Often, the 
teacher can have none of these aids; more often, he or she is unwilling 
to make a small beginning. 

Of course, the kind of lesson that the teacher is to give about the 
squirrel will depend partly upon whether he or she and the pupils 
already know anything by observation about squirrels. Many Na- 
ture lessons are absurd because they assume that the pupils know 
nothing whatever about the things discussed, when in fact they 
know much. Other lessons are scarcely less absurd because the 
teachers assume that the children know something about their topics 
but in reality know nothing. 

2 In a graded school, probably each teacher will be assigned to 

124 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

Lesson Notes. — (1) Talk about true kindness. Song, 
page 3. Have Dorothy recite from Lowell's "Vision- of Sir 
Launfal." Discuss specific acts of kindness with children. 

(2) Set of problems such as this: — "Isabel picked some 
cherries and gave Catherine, Marie, and Susan each nine. 
She had nine left herself. How many did she pick in all?" 
Work out 9x5 dramatically with five groups of nine chil- 
dren each, and with nine groups of five children each. Work 
by squares, etc., on blackboard, 9 x 10. (See Appendix V, 
Dramatic Number Lesson.) 

(3) New words, — tax, taxes, since. Review, — ever, fail, 
world, hire. 

(4) "Oh, there is not lost 

One of earth's charms: upon her bosom yet, 
After the flight of untold centuries, 
The freshness of her far beginning lies, 
And yet shall lie." 

Bring out the rhythmic beauty of the passage. Tell 
children how old the earth is. Tell them that it seems new 
to each new little child. Explain meaning of "charm," 
"flight," "centuries," and any word about which inquiry 
is made. 

(5) Make paper cuttings of squirrels in characteristic 
poses. Put on blackboard drawing. Have six children do 
same. 

(6) Help J. T. with his articulation of "s." Ask M. P. D. 
why she doesn't bring her home work. 

recess duty for a day once in every week or every fortnight. It is 
usually preferable to have the recesses separate for the older and the 
younger pupils. Even three or four divisions of a large school may 
be desirable. Unless there is a special physical culture teacher who 
teaches games and plays for recess, there should be instruction and 
direction by the principal and class teachers in recess play and 
manners. Some of the lessons may be given in the class-rooms. 
There are now several good practical books on the subject. 

125 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



II. EIGHTH YEAR AT SCHOOL 

Teacher has several subjects in each of two classes. 

General Daily Program Pupils from Special Day's 
a.m. Program, June 15 



9.00- 9.15 


Morning exercises 


Room 18 


Psalm xv (1) 


9.15- 9.45 


Arithmetic 


Room 18 


Class test : — percent- 
age and interest (2) 


9.45-10.15 


Arithmetic 


Room 19 


Class test: — percent- 
age and interest (2) 


10.15-10.30 


Recess 




See note 1 , p. 124, pre- 
ceding 

Review Asia R. & H. 
(3) 

Key of E (4) 


10.30-11.00 


Geography 


Room 19 


11.00-11.15 


Music 


Room 19 


11.15-11.45 


Geography 


Room 18 


Asia 


P.M. 

1.15- 1.45 


History 


Room 18 


C 's, pp. 401-410 

(5) 
E 


1.45- 1.55 


Music 


Room 19 


1.55- 2.10 


Writing 


Room 19 


OCQ(6) 


2.10- 2.20 


Recess 






2.20- 2.50 


History 


Room 19 


401-410 


2.50- 3.00 


Calisthenics 


Room 18 


Wands (7) 


3.00- 3.15 


Writing 


Room 18 


OCQ 


3.15- 3.30 


Study 


Room 18 


Go over to-morrow's 
geography (8) 



(1) Explain promises, contracts, agreements. Songs, 
pages 44, 89. Declamation by William S., "Horatius." 
Discuss recent change in protection tariff. 

(2) Test paper, five problems such as the following: — B 
had $600 and put it in a savings-bank for three years at 
4 per cent, compound interest semiannually. R had the 
same amount but loaned it out at 6 per cent, simple in- 
terest for three years. What amounts of interest did each 
receive at close of this period? 

(3) Compare carefully relative areas and populations of 
all the important countries. Draw sketch maps of Arabia, 
India, China, Japan Islands. 

(4) Review one-flat, two-flat, three-flat scales. Explain 
relation of C key to E key. Call attention to the melan- 

126 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

choly effect of the flats, and why. Compare with sharps, 
and why. Illustrate. Group children to illustrate. 

(5) Explain reconstruction policy of Republican party 
as partly caused by revenge for Lincoln's death, partly from 
hatred of victors for vanquished, partly by sheer ignorance 
of the character of the freedmen, partly by rise in North 
of unworthy men and of new men to high office, and partly 
as no policy at all but haphazard action. Show damage 
done to South by the Reconstruction Acts. Johnson was 
irascible and unsufficiently informed, Grant a soldier- 
engineer, not a statesman or a politician. Neither under- 
stood human nature thoroughly and broadly. 

(6) Work over the swing both from right to left and from 
left to right; and then proceed to capitals. Use both 
blackboard and pen-and-ink exercises. 

(7) Work for shoulder - straightening : use sixteen full 
overhead swings of wands. 

(8) Show children what study is. Take first paragraph, 
page 272. Discuss words: general meaning of sentences: 
special meanings : recall similar truths learned earlier. Com- 
pare Ganges with Danube and Susquehanna. Help J. T.; 
McL.; Hester, to read. They don't read yet. 



III. JUNIOR AND SENIOR SCIENCES IN HIGH SCHOOL 



General Daily Program Pupils from 

A.M. 

9.00- 9.20 Chapel exercises 

9.20-10.05 Senior chemistry Room 12 

10.05-10.45 Senior chemistry Room 26 

10.45-11.00 Recess 

11.00-11.40 Junior physics Room 9 

11.40-12.20 Junior physics Room 10 

12.20-12.50 Noon intermission 

12.50- 1.30 Free time 



Special Monday 
Program, Sept. 24 

Purify sea salt (1) 
Determine some im- 
purities (2) 

Pendulum (3) 
Pendulum (3) 



1.30- 2.10 Geology 

2.10- 2.30 Charge study hall 



Room 25 Chronology by eras (4) 



127 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

General Note. — The special teacher in the high school, 
like the college professor, seldom fails in the same way to 
prepare himself daily as does the general elementary school 
grade-and-class teacher. The high school expert is apt to 
take large enough views but not apt to complete the detail 
preparation. Often, he sets out to give lessons that are too 
long and above the knowledge and powers of his pupils. 

Lesson Notes. — (1) This lesson will require several days 
for accomplishment. Notes on "salts," iodine, organic 
matter, etc. 

(2) Assumes that Room 26 has proceeded a little faster 
than Room 12. 

(3) Show clocks with weights and with springs. Time 
and measure the 60-beat to the minute pendulum; the 30- 
beat; the 120-beat. Derive the law. Show how imma- 
terial the weight of pendulum is, provided heavy enough to 
acquire momentum and to preserve inertia. Draw arcs of 
these pendulums. 

(4) Etymology "zoic" and other parts of the terms 
"eozoic," "palaeozoic," etc. Make drawing to show earth's 
crust. On map show oldest and youngest surfaces on 
North American Continent. Define "rock." Assign and 

explain advance lesson, pages 15-20. G ? s Geology. 

Call up each pupil on cards for one question at least. Give 
references to encyclopedias, dictionaries, etc. 

It may be perhaps objected that the competent teacher 
can remember- all these points without writing them 
down. In many instances, this is true. No superin- 
tendent or principal is likely to insist that the teacher 
who can remember his special day's program shall write 
it down. But every good superintendent and every 
good principal does insist that before going into class, 
the teacher shall have clearly in mind all the work that 
he hopes to accomplish in that period with that class. 

128 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

Those who can certainly remember just what they have 
proposed to do are better off without notes than with 
them. But such persons need constantly to guard 
themselves against the spirit of improvisation, lest, in 
the presence of the class, they depart widely from, even 
hopelessly of return to, the proposed line of instruction. 
Now and then, a complete abandonment of the proposed 
lesson is commendable; but inventive and resourceful 
teachers who think that they do not need written notes 
are apt to carry the pupils at a jump into regions essen- 
tially incomprehensible to them. When the abandon- 
ment is of an advance lesson in favor of some review 
unexpectedly discovered as being needed, serious harm 
is not likely to result. 

In truth, the predicaments at end-of-term time of the 
two kinds of teachers who do not use prepared lesson 
plans are apt to be serious. Those of one kind are too 
indifferent to make such preparation, but live in self- 
confidence not merely from hour-to-hour without fore- 
sight but actually from minute-to-minute trusting to 
"inspiration" and to the suggestions of events and op- 
portunities. Those of the other kind are often without 
sufficient imagination to conceive of the class and reci- 
tation save in the actual presence of necessity. The 
teacher who trusts his or her mother wits may be brill- 
iant but is not likely to be thorough or complete. For 
want of method and of carefully considered devices, he 
loses much time and often the sight of the true goal. 
The teacher who dully waits to see what the turn of 
affairs will be seldom arrives anywhere, seldom goes at 
all. The brilliant teacher is redeemable: the dull, un- 
imaginative teacher is incurable. 

It is, of course, true that no one can foresee exactly 

129 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

what a day is to bring forth, — of work, of need, of op- 
portunity. For days, for weeks, for months, a teacher 
may see each day's plan fairly realized ; then may come 
days, weeks, months, when things go differently, even 
go wrong. A parent or several parents, a supervisor, 
a politician, a bad boy or girl or both or several, a new 
text-book that will not "work," — that does not serve 
the needs properly, — a shortage of books or supplies, 
bad weather, ill-health, misfortune, an unpleasant per- 
son in a neighboring class-room, an excess of laggard 
pupils, an insufficient proportion of stimulating pupils, 
want of authority in the head of the school, weak new 
teachers — any one or more of a thousand factors may 
suddenly or slowly intervene to break up a hitherto 
delightful relation between plan and fulfilment. 

The making of a good program for a district school, 
taught by one teacher with a large number of pupils, 
is one of the difficult mechanical tasks of pedagogy. It 
involves many conflicts of sound educational principles 
and of the interests of individual pupils. I have seen 
a teacher in such a school with sixty children ten grades 
apart, — beginners too small to learn to read and ad- 
vanced pupils taking Latin, physics and geometry. 
Attempts have been made to standardize the "district 
school" into three "forms" or "cycles"; and this per- 
haps fits the general need more frequently than does any 
other. But of three-form eight-graded schools, one with 
twenty pupils averaging twelve years of age is one thing; 
and another with sixty averaging nine years of age 
is quite another. The fluctuations from summer to 
winter and again to spring present yet other difficulties. 
A few principles may, however, prove generally applica- 
ble: a few others may be occasionally helpful. 

130 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

1. Make the number of classes for recitation purposes 
as small as possible. 

2. Put as many pupils into each recitation class as is 
reasonably defensible. 

3. Make each recitation period as long as possible. 

4. Work as many classes together in one subject at the 
same time as possible, either hearing all recite together or 
hearing one recite while directing others in the same study. 

5. Do not try to have the same subjects invariably every 
day. 

6. Keep an eye always for the classes not reciting and 
see that they have study-lessons or "busy work" in their 
seats. 

7. If possible, let each class recite at least once in every 
hour. 

8. Let no class have less than three recitations, however 
brief, each day. 

9. Provide for abundance of written work. 

10. Keep at least one day each week and an extra day 
each month relatively free to help backward classes and 
pupils, — to "pick up dropped stitches. " 

11. In large schools, requiring four "forms," it may 
prove helpful to let older pupils assist considerably, not in 
teaching or in discipline, of course, but to give recess signals, 
to follow the movements of smaller pupils, to assist in 
handling materials, and in other ways to help economize 
the time of the teacher. 

12. In such schools, keep making time for and progress 
in arithmetic and English, whatever else must be set aside. 

13. Always have morning exercises, — music, some ethical 
lesson, general directions, memory gem or other literary 
feature by class or individual, story-telling, — and, if pos- 
sible, have "something special" for part of Friday after- 
noon. 

14. In large schools, make three programs, — one for Mon- 
10 131 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



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133 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

day and Wednesday, another for Tuesday and Thursday, 
and a third for Friday. (Upon occasion, the teacher may 
say, — " Now for to-morrow, though it is Monday [or Wednes- 
day] we will have our Tuesday [or Friday] program. But 
so far as is possible, let each subject come at the same hour 
each day that you have it. 

15. Do not neglect the beginners or indeed any children 
under nine years old. Get them well started. 

16. As soon as possible after " sizing up the situation " and 
discovering how much and how little can probably be done, 
come to a clear understanding with the next higher school 
authority whether township or county superintendent or 
local board of education or visitors or trustees or State 
supervisor — by whatever name that authority is called or 
in whatever, office he is (or they are) — as to just what you 
propose to accomplish. This avoids possible later misun- 
derstandings. Do this, no matter how ignorant or how 
"political" that authority may be. 

Often district school teachers with large schools be- 
come discouraged; and sometimes those in small schools 
became equally discouraged. The first may have too 
much to do. "Blessed are your eyes, for you see, and 
your ears, for you hear." The second may feel that 
they have too little to do. Yours then is the opportunity 
to do much for each child, and to master both the sub- 
ject-matter and the pedagogy of such a school. 

To help the teacher remain true to his course, nothing 
serves better than a record of the past. The teacher 
who makes regularly a plan of the day's work and keeps 
a file of these plans scarcely needs the annalistic diary 
or similar note-book or file -record. But all other 
teachers do need the historical record. Especially do 
experienced teachers require a record of the class- 

134 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

accomplishment. The human memory plays two tricks 
with those who for the fourth or the tenth or the thir- 
tieth time are going over the same subject. It makes 
one fill the recent past with details belonging to an 
earlier time. The teacher thinks that he has taught 
so-and-so when he really has not taught it. And the 
other trick of memory is yet worse: it creates an illu- 
sory past so that one thinks that the world is getting 
worse, — that the children of the year 1911 are not do- 
ing so well as those of the year 1910 or 1901, or 1891 
or 1876. The note-book tells the truth. It helps the 
cause of justice. 

The judiciary understand this and will believe even 
an untruthful man's diary rather than a truthful man's 
memory. This is not due to the decadence of human 
memory in civilization but to the world-old activity of 
imagination and of fancy, which are forever reconstruct- 
ing past events in the desire to understand them 
better and realistically to renew their pleasures. 
Men do not often record falsehoods in writing: their 
invincible and necessary optimism creates falsehoods 
out of facts by suppression usually of partial features of 
the facts. 

Such is the nature of some persons that they prefer 
to record the day's accomplishment rather than to write 
down its plan in advance. Those who do this in school 
work are usually good reviewers and drill-masters. When 
for want of a plan, in an emergency in a recitation, they 
do not know what next to do for progress in the subject, 
they resort to review or to drill; in some grades, unless 
these reviews are too frequent, in some subjects in any 
grade, they do but little harm. Any logical subject 
whether arithmetic or political economy or metaphysics 

135 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

will bear an immense amount of drill upon its essentials 
and fundamentals. But such unintended reviews and 
drills produce weariness of the pupils in the informa- 
tional or so-called " content" studies; nor are they 
expedient when often repeated in the psychological and 
physiological exercises. The soldier who has been 
drilled for twenty years in the manual of arms cannot 
find his place in ordinary society. His mind and his 
body are victimized by routine; he is overtrained, lit- 
erally has been " drawn along," — instructed, literally 
" pulled in" — too often. The experienced draughtsman 
cannot become an architect. He sees the world too nar- 
rowly; his fancy is dead. 

There is such a thing as "overschooling". It is the 
result of being reviewed and drilled and tested and 
trained and instructed too much and too long by these 
very teachers who, being without imagination or in- 
vention, without scholarship and aspiration, drill when 
they should be teaching. 

Back of the movement to enrich all schools is the pro- 
test of half-nourished, overtrained, too much disciplined 
men and women whose schooling was regimentation, not 
education. 

In making a record that shall be valuable, the teacher 
who intends to know three months, six months, ten 
years afterward, in truth just what his class did accom- 
plish needs especially to record such matters as (1) the 
pages of the various text-books assigned from day to 
day both for advance lessons and for reviews; (2) the 
important topics actually discussed; and (3) the marks 
given to pupils; and should file (4) the tests, reviews 
and examinations given. It is not useless sometimes to 
have on hand specimen papers (say) two very good 

136 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

ones, two average and two poor ones from term to term 
and from year to year. 1 

In making either plan or record, we are likely to find 
some kind of card or loose leaf system better than entry 
in books and far better than filing loose papers of 
irregular size. 

This general subject of each day's work is too in- 
timately connected with the larger subject of the assign- 
ment for the month, for the term and for the year, to 
be closed without some reference to the whole of which 
the day's work is but a part. 

Two plans prevail for beginning a new grade's work 
whether it be after annual promotion or semiannual. 
One is to take a week or two at the beginning to review 
the work of the class in the earlier grade. To this, there 
is one serious objection, — it tends to discourage the pupils, 
making the brighter ones feel and say that the promo- 
tion did not mean anything because they are "doing the 
same old lessons." This usually leads to parental criti- 
cism of the teachers and sometimes to protests to higher 
authorities. 

The other plan is to plunge at once into new work, 
making no or but little inquiry into the question as to 
how much of the former work the pupils remember and 
can do. This always makes trouble in the logical or 
"form" studies. 

1 1 have always been sorry that I did not keep the names and 
addresses of every pupil that I myself have had as a teacher in my 
various academic college and university classes. There have been 
several times in my life when such records would have been helpful 
to me. In all such matters there is, of course, a golden mean; but 
most of us err, at least in our early years, in not providing records 
against the time when, from sheer burden of the items of experience, 
we forget, or appear to forget, many of them. 

137 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

The true solution of the matter is, by doing both, to 
do neither exclusively. There should be enough ad- 
vance work especially in the informational studies to 
make the pupils know and feel that they are really 
going forward, while there should be enough review in 
all other studies and in the physiological and psycho- 
logical exercises to assure the teacher that the founda- 
tions are sound. In truth, the advanced teacher needs 
more to know what the pupils know and can do well 
than what they do not know and cannot do well, for 
our assets are our knowledge and skill, not our ignorance 
and our deficiencies. The ingenious teacher, indeed, 
will do much reviewing that his pupils do not suspect. 

Yet more important, as affecting a longer period of 
time, is it for the school authorities, who in this instance 
should certainly include the practical class teachers, so 
to apportion the amounts of advance work required 
each month, week and day that each day's lesson is about 
equally hard and long to accomplish as is every other 
day's. This means that the first lessons should appar- 
ently be the shortest, and that the tests and reviews 
should be fairly apportioned. Because a half year con- 
tains about one hundred days, it does not follow that 
each day the class in history should cover one -hun- 
dredth of the entire assignment of the text-book. In 
a general way, the longer lessons should be toward the 
end of the term, provided that the more difficult pages 
have more time allotted to them than the easier. 
In a general way, the reviews should be more frequent 
in the logical than in the informational studies. To be 
specific, a class that is to do four Books of Ccesar's Com- 
mentaries and some reading at sight (say) in Sallust 
should not be expected to read more than one-tenth of 

138 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

the material in the first quarter of the year. A class 
that must perform one hundred and twelve experi- 
ments in Physics does well to perform about half a 
dozen in the first four weeks. This is not " rushing 
things at the end"; it is using at the end the momentum 
acquired earlier. 

In a general way, drills, tests, and reviews should 
occupy a quarter of the entire time in informational 
studies, and half the time in the logical. These pro- 
portions are, however, too small for primary grades and 
too large for secondary schools; and fairly represent 
only the needs of middle grammar grades with classes of 
ordinary powers and proficiencies. Even this principle 
requires modification to suit the special qualities of the 
teacher. Rapid teachers need to review more than do 
slower ones. Brilliant classes need more frequent and 
more thorough reviews than do slower, safer classes. 

Far more minds are injured by insufficient drills and 
reviews than by too many. At the same time, it is 
requisite to remember that reviews, drills and tests must 
not be so frequent or so severe as to worry and dis- 
hearten the pupils. Young minds like the new. Where- 
fore that teacher who in every review yet adds a little 
that is new and who in every advance lesson does some 
reviewing is ingenious, meritorious and probably popu- 
lar with his pupils. 

When all else has been said, these things remain: — 

First, the teacher, and not the "higher authority, " 
does the educating except in so far as principal or super- 
visor comes directly into the pupil's life. 

Second, it is the day's work that tells the story of 
success or failure, not the term's or year's plan or the 
summer vacation's aspiration. 

139 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Third, it is the spirit of the teacher in the day's work 
that wins for himself and for his pupils victory or de- 
feat, the good courage or a sense of failure. 

And in respect to this essential matter of the heart of 
the teacher in the work from day to day, there is a little 
self-criticism that often helps a deal; it is as little as the 
deflection of the rudder that sends the ship about; and 
yet it is as effective. No teacher has any right to a 
personal mood that is not in harmony with the eager 
and hopeful lives of youth, — no teacher whether in 
kindergarten, grammar school, college or university. 
There may be terribly hard things to endure, and there 
often are. The teacher who cannot control his grief, 
whatever be its cause, or his wrath or his discouragements, 
his timidity or envy or other abnormal mood, should take 
a vacation, whether for a day or a year or ever after; 
at such times, he does not belong in the school- room. 
This is not meant to read out of their tasks the chesrful 
invalid or the brave man or woman in the day of afflic- 
tion or trouble. There are some who overcome and who 
have entered into an inheritance of peace. Widows, 
daughters of bankrupt fathers, men who have failed in 
business or in other professions often make the best of 
teachers because they have learned more of the mean- 
ing of life than the uniformly fortunate can ever know. 
Even children have an especial respect for these re- 
deemed ones, — there is much personal dignity in such 
as are reconciled to whatever fate befalls. We may 
know them by a certain calm and by a certain silence 
in respect to matters of which some talk lightly and 
others violently. 

The teacher, setting his face or her face toward the 
school-house or a college lecture-hall of a morning, should 

140 



THE DAY'S WORK— ITS PLAN AND RECORD 

go gladly, for there at least are eager and grateful lis- 
teners — with futures yet to be won, with strength not 
yet overtried, with hope and faith and love at least 
for the teacher in their hearts. Especially should we 
who deal with children remember that it is our high and 
special privilege to deal for livelihood not with adults 
who have usually broken one or more of the ten com- 
mandments but with those little ones of the kingdom 
of heaven like whom adults must again become, if we 
also would enter into that kingdom. It may indeed 
be that by good teaching and by an equally good ex- 
ample, some at least of these children will always at 
heart remain throughout life superior to all temptations, 
submission to which is exile from that kingdom. 

The day's work of the teacher is, upon final analysis, 
the reflection of what the teacher himself is. Among 
children, fair speech and other concealments avail but 
little; they are the readers of character, not being de- 
ceived by their own self-interest or by fear, being indeed 
deceived only in respect to matters beyond their com- 
prehension — and even then catching, as it were in- 
stinctively, the moods of hatred or of good- will toward 
men. 

For the teacher when proceeding to the daily tasks, no 
motto is more fitting than the saying of the herald 
angels, — " Peace on earth, good- will toward men." 



" Skilful teachers make instruction in all subjects moral — 
by arousing a pure desire for truth, a spirit of intellectual 
honesty, a will to work and to overcome difficulties, and a 
long line of modest, every-day virtues." — Elmer Ells- 
worth Brown, The Making of Our Middle Schools. 



CHAPTER VI 

CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND OF THE INDIVIDUAL 

Review of terms used in education. — The force-theory. — -The skill- 
theory. — School-and-home theory. — Pupil self-government theory. 
— Manual work in relation to discipline. — Virtue is at the point of 
strain. — Moral aims in education. — Means to attain them. — When is 
corporal punishment necessary? — Seating a class so as to avoid un- 
necessary conditions leading to disorder. — Directing the movements 
of the class. — Fire-drills. — The mechanics of class control. — Learning 
each pupil. — Physical defects. — Schools and classes for the incorri- 
gible, for the defective, for the laggard, for the blind, for the deaf, for 
the crippled. — Tests of feeble-mindedness. — The reasonable stand- 
ards of conduct in children and youth. — The school virtues. 

IN education, we use many more or less technical 
words, and often with but little accuracy. In no 
phase of the work of education do we use words with 
less accuracy than in that of the control of the class and 
the discipline of the individual. Before proceeding to 
a discussion of this phase of education, it is more than 
desirable, — for it is both expedient and necessary, — to 
consider with care and thoroughness the terms to be 
employed. It is doubtless best to take the situation 
into wide review. 

To "educate" means to a make to come. forth" or to 
" cause to go forward." In this sense, all education is 
compulsory. Strictly speaking, no one may properly 
use the term "spontaneous education," for it is a con- 
tradiction in terms. "The educator makes states of 

145 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

consciousness that are not accidental or incidental or 
occasional but purposive and usually systematic and 
always either consecutive or in regular alternation." * 
Thereby, he effects changes in the course of the de- 
velopment of the soul and of the body of the educatee : 
he compels him to be different. 

To "instruct" is to "draw in." Naturally, the pupil 
wanders from the highway of learning, from the method 
by which he should enter into knowledge. As the 
shepherd with his crook goes after the lost sheep in the 
wilderness to pull and guide and even to carry him back, 
so the educator instructs the lost youth. He sets him 
again upon the beaten track that the righteous and wise 
have followed. 

To "train" is to "draw," even to "drag along." It 
concerns especially the lazy and the weak. 

To "teach," as we have seen, is to "show"; and to 
' ' learn " is to " go forward " by a " method " or " highway. ' ' 

To "direct" is to "point right" — to mark the goal. 

To "correct" is to "set right," and implies that the 
corrected individual is going wrong. 

To "punish" is to "inflict a penalty upon"; and to 
"chastise" is to "make clean" or " pure." 

To "study" is to "agonize over." 

To "exercise" is to "shine forth." 

To "control" is to "draw with." 

To "govern" is to "pilot" or "guide." 

To "manage" is to "work in the hand," as one kneads 
flour and water and makes dough; or to "do by hand," 
meaning to "finish carefully." It always conveys the 
idea of care as to details. 

1 Chancellor, A Theory of Motives, Ideals and Values in Education, 
p. 22. 

146 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

To " administer " is to " touch the hand to." 

To " supervise" is to " oversee." 

To " discipline" is to "treat as a little learner." It is 
almost the same as to "baby." 

A few illustrations may serve to draw out the con- 
trasted meanings of these terms. 

Properly speaking, one may say that: 

1. In a large city, the school superintendent administers 
the schools but manages his office affairs. 

2. A father directs, corrects and controls his family, 
while the mother governs and manages the household. In 
the same sense, a principal should captain the school while 
the several teachers pilot their own classes. 

3. The principal who whips a pupil is punishing him, for 
whipping is too harsh a chastisement to be designated 
properly by the term disciplining. 

In such light as may be derived from reflection upon 
these terms and from review of remarks made in an 
earlier chapter upon the temperaments of teachers, 1 we 
may proceed to a consideration of what is, for many 
teachers, a more serious problem than teaching itself, — 
class government. , There prevail in American schools 
two different kinds of theory and practice in respect to se- 
curing from the class and its individual pupils conformity 
to "the rules of the school" and to the customs of polite 
society. These two kinds of school government are in 
straight opposition to one another with no possible 
reconciliation or compromise. In addition to these 
two wide-spread theories and practices, there are two 
others that have recognition here and there. For con- 

1 Pages 101, 102, above. 
11 147 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

venience, let us designate these four modes of class and 
pupil control somewhat as follows — viz.: 

1. The force-theory of school management. 

2. The skill-theory of school control. 

3. The school-and-home theory. 

4. The pupil self-government theory. 

Proceeding to a critical examination of each of these 
theories, let us note briefly and clearly what each theory 
with its resultant practice means in itself and in com- 
parison with the other theories. 

1. According to the force- theory, boys and girls and 
youth even through high school and into college, in 
many, perhaps in most, instances, do not desire to con- 
form to the rules of the school and to the customs of 
polite society or even to the expressed wishes and hopes 
of their teachers but of deliberate will or of natural 
depravity are prone to err, even delight in erring; and 
they must be compelled to obey. 

The common mode of such compulsion is corporal 
pain caused by punishment: this mode is supported by 
threats of punishment. It is extended into the grades 
and schools when the pupils are too large to be whipped 
by the mode of sarcasm and of diatribe — supported by 
threats of explusion or of suspension, seldom executed. 
Under certain unfortunate conditions, to be developed 
fully later herein, the force-method is absolutely neces- 
sary. 

2. According to the skill-theory of school control, 
boys and girls of all ages, in most instances, perhaps in 
nearly all, go to school desiring to learn. When proper- 
ly taught, they inquire of their own accord into the 
rules of the school, the customs of polite society, and 

148 



CONTROL OF THE GLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

the wishes and hopes of their teachers in respect both 
to proficiency and to conduct and set out diligently 
and constantly to obey and to conform. Relatively 
but few pupils require any orders; of these few, not one 
in a hundred needs to be forced by blows to obey, and 
in the event of disobedience even this less-than-one-in- 
a-hundred boy can, in good schools, be punished in bet- 
ter fashion than by physical force. 

This theory asserts that disorder in a class-room and 
disobedience in the individual pupil are evidences that 
the teacher is without skill in teaching. Instead of oblig- 
ing his pupils to obey, he punishes them for disobedience, 
which is proof that he cannot control them. 

3. The oldest of all these theories and practices of 
pupil-and-class government is that the school is an 
auxiliary of the home. Except under orders from 
parents, no pupil is to be physically punished at school 
or even detained after school for admonition, but the 
teacher is to throw back upon the parents the respon- 
sibility for his offence and also of the proper penalizing 
for the offence. This school-and-home theory continues 
to this day in some old communities of the East and 
South and in the new communities of the West that 
have been settled mostly by families of many genera- 
tions in this country and of the Teutonic stock. It is 
a theory vigorously advocated by many parents and by 
some teachers to this day even in communities where 
one or the other of the main theories is in full control 
of the situation. 

4. The newest of all these theories and practices of 
school government declares that in any grade an Ameri- 
can boy or girl assisted by other boys and girls can not 
only govern himself but learn much about human so- 

149 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

ciety in so doing. It assumes that pupils are little men 
and women. It even assumes that nearly all men and 
women can and do so govern themselves as to afford 
proper and adequate examples to children in self- 
government. 

This pupil self-government theory is worked out 
elaborately in not a few city and town schools, — 
especially in the grammar grades and in the high schools, 
— and for its proper exposition requires far more space 
than can be given to it in this treatment of a much 
larger theme that includes it as but one of many features. 

Obviously, within each of these theories is a philos- 
ophy of human nature, of society, of life. Obviously, 
the theories cannot all be reconciled. But it will set 
us forward upon our argument to consider what these 
several philosophies are. We choose one or another of 
these philosophies, — express one or another, — when we 
advocate or adopt (or both advocate and adopt) one 
or another of these practices. 

Within the force - theory and practices of school 
government is a philosophy that men are essentially 
animals, that force rules, that but little of our conduct 
is rational, that therefore " sparing the rod spoils the 
child," that better is obedience, though so enforced as 
to engender hate, than disobedience that leaves the child 
with contempt for authority, that society is far, far 
greater than the individual and must overcome him 
speedily lest he become lawless and injurious. 

This view has had the support of some great names 
in human history. "Of all animals," argued Plato, 
"the boy is the most unmanageable, inasmuch as he has 
the fountain of reason in him not yet regulated; he is 
the most insidious, sharp-witted, and insubordinate of 

150 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

animals. Wherefore, he must be bound with many 
bridles. One who comes upon him (when transgress- 
ing) and does not inflict upon him the punishment that 
he deserves shall incur the greatest disgrace." * And 
Comenius said, "He gave no bad definition who de- 
clared that man was 'a tractable animal. ' And indeed 
it is only by a proper education that he can become a 
man." 2 This view, however, presents many philosoph- 
ical difficulties. If man is essentially an animal, at 
what stage does he become essentially human? Is the 
process automatic? If so, of what value is education? 
If not, can it be that the Maker of man has left in- 
dividual men at the mercy of their fellows to deliver 
them or not to deliver them from being essentially 
animals? It is indeed a childish and crude view, long 
outgrown alike by metaphysicist and by biologist, and 
significant to us only because it reappears from time to 
time in the theories of unscholarly and unscientific 
writers and upon the lips of ignorant and sometimes 
angry and disillusioned men. 

Behind this view are indeed many instructive lessons 
and some warnings of human history that will doubt- 
less occur to the readers of these pages. 

Within the skill-theory and practise of school control 
is a philosophy that men are essentially rational, that 
ideas rule, that but little of our conduct, and that only 
of the baser kind of human beings and of better men in 
only their baser moments, is brutish, that using the rod 
reduces teacher and pupil to a lower than their natural 
level, that obedience compelled by rod or threat is 
worse than disobedience, which leaves the child at least 
without hatred of his superiors, that the individual is 

1 The Laws, Book VII. 2 The Great Didactic, Chapter I. 

151 



Class teaching and management 

a fact and society only an abstraction, and that the 
child whose will has been broken by force is certain to 
make a worthless or a sullen adult. 

Said Immanuel Kant: " Horses and dogs are broken 
in, and man, too, may be broken in. But it is not enough 
that children should be merely broken in; it is emi- 
nently important that they learn to think. According- 
ly, the management of schools should depend entirely 
upon the judgment of highly enlightened experts." 1 
According to Froebel, "a suppressed or perverted good 
quality, — a good tendency, only repressed, misunder- 
stood or misdirected, — lies originally at the bottom of 
every shortcoming of man. Hence, the only and the 
infallible remedy for counteracting any shortcoming or 
even wickedness is to find the originally good source, the 
originally good side of the human being that has been 
repressed, disturbed or misled into the shortcoming, and 
then to foster, to build up and then properly to guide 
this good side. Thus the shortcoming or wickedness 
will at last disappear, although it may involve a hard 
struggle against habit but not against the original de- 
pravity of man; and this is accomplished the more surely 
and rapidly, for man at heart prefers right to wrong." 2 

For myself, in sailing round many cities, upon many 
adventures, I may indeed say as one who has known 
the affections and the virtues, the hatreds and the 
malice of men that, to my notion, every vice is the re- 
sult either of some arrest in development or of some 
perversion of a good quality. It may not be philo- 
sophically demonstrable that, as Socrates said, " Knowl- 
edge is virtue"; but no man will ever rise higher 
in his view of the sin of others than in the prayer of 

1 On Pedagogy. 2 On the Education of Man. 

152 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

Jesus on the cross, — " Father, forgive them, for they 
know not what they do." 

Behind the view that the true way to deal with con- 
duct is intellectual and compassionate, not moral and 
vindictive, are many instructive lessons and some 
warnings of human history. 

Within the school-and-home theory of class-and-pupil 
government is a philosophy that men are essentially 
domestic and social beings, that love rules, that most 
of our conduct is emotional and controlled by affections 
for kin and friends, that the primary social institution 
is the family and its ministers are the father and the 
mother, to whom the pupil belongs, that if therefore 
corporal or other physical punishment is to be used, 
the father or the mother is to use it, that the question 
whether or not the boy or girl obeys the teacher is rela- 
tively unimportant, provided that he obeys the parent 
and that the parent duly punishes, reprimands or other- 
wise corrects the child or youth, that for the boy or the girl 
the home is the all important social institution, and the 
school is merely an agency for the home, and that so 
long as the home does control the boy, he is safely on 
the way to make a good citizen, churchman, worker, 
and otherwise fit member of adult society. "I wanted 
to prove," wrote Pestalozzi, "by my experiment that 
if public education is to have any real value, it must 
imitate the methods that make the merit of domestic 
education." 1 

This view also has much warrant in history, — and 
yet is not universally true. 

Within the pupil self-government theory is a philos- 
ophy that justice is quite as discernible and quite as 

1 On the Work at Stanz. 
153 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

authoritative among children and youth as among 
adults; that the true preparation for life as a demo- 
cratic self-governed man or woman consists in a demo- 
cratic school life. This theory asserts that boys and 
girls in a modern American school are quite as fit as 
are most voters and office-holders to make and to exe- 
cute laws. Speaking practically, the men and women 
who as teachers establish self-government plans in 
their schools say that just as adult society sets up 
in the State as judges and in the Church as bishops 
learned and wise and well-matured men ; so the school 
sets up the teachers as the final court of appeal, — the 
forum of last resort, — in the pupil self-government 
scheme of social organization and operation. Let the 
boys and girls err, if they must, upon some occasions; 
they are getting the best of educations thereby. The 
one way to learn judgment and righteousness, to care 
for truth and for order and the other social virtues, is 
to exercise these qualities in school. The boy, who is 
told what is right and railroaded therein by either force 
or persuasion, becomes the dependent man. Self- 
reliance must begin as early in life as the power to 
choose one's course and to persist therein begins. 

This is a new, a generally non-historical, a brilliantly 
philosophical view, yet one not without confirmation 
at least in some instances in the experience of the 
race. 

Before passing in detail upon these theories and prac- 
tises, it is expedient to note a few statistical facts. 

First: The force-theory still prevails in over forty 
States of the Union and in most towns and cities. 

Second: It was once the universal view. 

Third : Even in these States and cities, many teachers 

154 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

no longer " wield the rod" or otherwise "cow their 
pupils " into submission. 

Fourth: The best American teachers are not expo- 
nents of this theory. It is, however, universal in 
monarchical Germany, where nearly all the teachers 
are men. 

Fifth: The skill-theory is the law of the entire State of 
New Jersey and of the largest city of the nation, New 
York. It is universal in republican France, whereas in re- 
publican America a majority of the teachers are women. 

Sixth: It is the theory of most of those who reject 
the force-theory. 

Seventh: It is the practice of most of the best- 
trained teachers and of the most successful teachers. 

Eighth: The home-and-school theory works well in 
many schools, especially in private and endowed schools 
and in the public schools of small communities. 

Ninth: Though scarcely gaining ground, it disputes 
its losses every inch of the way and shows a vitality 
that suggests possible recovery. It was never the uni- 
versal view; but it had greater vogue a century ago 
than the skill-theory and was the first theory to break 
the omnipotent universality of the force-theory. 

Tenth: The pupil self-government theory is new, is 
aggressive, sometimes succeeds in practice, and has 
much fascination for several different kinds of en- 
thusiasts : — for those who are of philosophical, of philan- 
thropic, of empirical, of radical frames of mind. 

Eleventh: It introduces an elaborate machinery into 
school affairs. 

Twelfth: These four theories will all survive our own 
generation, and must be reckoned with accordingly. 

Each of these theories fits perfectly one and only 

155 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

one of the four masculine temperaments, — the force- 
theory fits the muscular motor individual's views of 
life and conduct, the skill-theory the nervous motor, the 
school-and-home theory the vital sympathetic, and the 
self-government the speculative. From the fact that 
most teachers belong to the second kind of humanity, 
it is fairly safe to predict that the skill-theory will gen- 
erally displace the force-theory and finally be recog- 
nized as the standard of American practice in school 
discipline. This, however, does not prove that it is 
the best theory. It may indeed be true that American 
schools are too largely controlled and taught by persons 
of the nervous motor temperament. 

With these general and perhaps fairly comprehensive 
propositions before us, it becomes possible to deal with 
these theories in detail, not so much for the purpose of 
choosing between them as for the purpose of showing 
how to supply their deficiencies and to ameliorate their 
severities in actual practice. It is, indeed, seldom pos- 
sible for class teachers themselves really to choose be- 
tween these methods. 

The teacher who is to rule his class (or hers) because 
the children or youth fear his (or her) power to inflict 
corporal punishment upon them is thereby relieved of 
a certain kind of effort, — which is to discover a way to 
resolve the difficulties in the character and ability of 
the mischievous, of the disobedient, of the restless and 
inattentive by causing internal changes in their views 
of life and in their dispositions toward others through 
discovery and realization of new ideals. Such a teacher 
has a short cut to this end, — in the rural school, he whips 
the boy or shuts him up in a closet, fastens clothes- 
pins upon his fingers, perhaps knocks him down. In 

156 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

the city school, he sends the boy to the principal for 
any one of several kinds of whipping, — on the hands 
with a ruler, on the legs with a rattan or a rod or a 
switch. The pain sets up an intellectual and moral 
reaction. How severe the corporal punishment is de- 
pends partly upon the seriousness of the offence, the 
previous record of the offender, his size and age, his 
social standing, and upon the temperament, health, 
and judgment of the one who punishes. 

Occasionally, even girls and those of twelve or fifteen 
years of age are the subjects of corporal punishment. 

It is true that in New Jersey and in New York City, 
most of the schoolmasters and mistresses say that all ne- 
cessity for corporal punishment has entirely passed away. 
But though human nature either in the teacher or in 
the children does not differ in New Jersey or in New York 
City from human nature as exhibited in (say) Connecti- 
cut or Ohio or Texas, most schoolmasters and mistresses 
of our country say that the necessity for corporal pun- 
ishment does exist and will exist always. As one who 
has managed city school systems in New Jersey and 
taught in New York some fifteen years, — as well as in 
the District of Columbia where corporal punishment 
even of negro children almost never occurs, — I happen 
to know as a matter of fact that the school-atmosphere 
in these regions is rather better than anywhere that 
corporal punishment prevails. As one who has visited 
schools in forty different States, however, I know that 
corporal punishment is a necessity in nearly all of them. 
What is the answer to the riddle? School organization 
and administration. 

In order to govern boys and girls of various races, 
natioualities, languages, and religions, without resort 

157 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

to force, it is necessary to have the following features 
in the schools — viz.: 

First: Teachers of adequate scholarship, training and 
natural ability. They must be professionally selected 
for, and not politically introduced into, the schools. 

Second: They must have tenure of office. (In New 
Jersey, a teacher is removable only upon proof of in- 
competence in a regular law-court.) With such tenure, 
what the teacher says to the pupil is said without fear 
of loss of position through offending some politician. 
The teacher, not some lay board member or the boss 
behind the member, is the school; and every boy and 
parent and citizen knows the fact. There is no need of 
the blow of a rod to demonstrate it upon the palms or 
the thighs of a small boy. 

Third: For incorrigibles and habitual truants, there 
must be in large cities special individual help classes; 
and throughout the State, reform schools or homes to 
which the teachers may directly commit these boys and 
girls. (The intervention of a prosecuting attorney often 
completely foils the effort of teachers to put naturally 
bad boys where they belong.) 

Fourth: There is required a system of what are 
usually called " manual training" courses, — e. g., mat- 
weaving, basketry, bent-iron work, knife-work in wood, 
carpentry, mechanical drawing, freehand drawing, color 
work, outdoor sketching, sewing, dressmaking, millinery, 
cooking, household sanitation, personal hygiene (partly 
through physical labor), gardening. This system lays 
the foundations for agriculture, metallurgy, household 
management, woodworking, and clothes-making. In 
respect to discipline, it helps realize three purposes: 
1st. It uses the surplus physical energy of boys and 

158 






CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

girls that otherwise goes into " restlessness/' mischief- 
making, and defiance of authority. 2d. It develops 
psychical energy for use in the so-called "scholastic" 
or "intellectual" studies and thereby overcomes in- 
attention, indolence, and similar offences against proper 
school-behavior. 3d. It affords a perfect means of dis- 
cipline in two ways: — I. A certain kind of bad boy or 
girl may be given double and triple amounts of manual 
work to do, being thereby deprived of his or her scholas- 
tic work. II. The opposite kind of bad boy may be de- 
prived of the privilege of his or her manual work until 
reform is evident. These punishments operate partly 
because among boys and among girls it is a social dis- 
grace to a boy or to a girl to be treated as an individual 
case, to be isolated from the mass, as it were to be con- 
sidered an Ishmaelite. 

Fifth: In cities, there must be, as a matter of general 
school administration, a process by which occasional 
offenders may discover that the way of the transgressor 
is long, if not hard, by sending him first to the principal's 
office, next, if necessary, to that of a district superin- 
tendent, then, if still necessary, to one of the associate 
or assistant superintendents, and last to the city super- 
intendent, in each instance, invariably accompanied by 
parent or guardian. (In two years' experience in a 
city organized as above, with sixty thousand pupils, 
not one pupil ever actually came as far as the superin- 
tendent's office. In every case, those started thither 
either disappeared in some incorrigible class or reformed 
in the course of this process.) 

In all towns and cities, it should be customary to try 
boys who fail of good conduct in another school, with 
another teacher and other comrades. The walk out- 

159 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

side the ward or district, the contact with strangers, the 
new personality of the teacher, in my experience, cures 
the boy in nine cases out of ten. The method, of course, 
is one of self-estrangement, and is both philosophically 
valid and practically useful. 

But where one (or more) of these features of a correctly 
administered school system, — State or city, — is wanting, 
corporal punishment may be necessary. 

There are two kinds of teachers in our schools to-day, 
— those who get their good recitations from their pupils 
by enforcing order among them, and those who have 
order by getting from their pupils good recitations. The 
first kind of teachers get interest, study, lessons via 
management, the second kind get the results of manage- 
ment via instruction. Teachers of the first kind are 
entirely at home, — at ease, — in schools where corporal 
punishments and threats of corporal punishment are 
in evidence or just behind the scenes. Teachers of the 
second kind are not interested in the matter for them- 
selves. This is one of the conditions whereby the cor- 
poral punishment system lasts so long and continues 
so general. Its defenders are ardent, the rest care but 
little. Not teachers but public opinion put the system 
out of the State of New Jersey, the City of New York, 
and the District of Columbia. 

Where, however, there is no authority in the teacher 
as such, where the teacher is not adequately equipped 
by nature, by general scholarship and by professional 
training for the whole work of educating boys and 
youth, where there are no classes for incorrigibles 
and no reform schools or homes, where there is no 
outlet for boyish energy in manual training and the 
arts and crafts, where pupils can appeal immediately 

160 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

to politician, newspaper or board member when a 
postponed punishment is threatened as on the way, 
there corporal punishment, prompt, effective, and duly 
apportioned to the offence is for the teacher who be- 
lieves in it the only course. In all such places, corporal 
punishment as a next-to-last recourse is right; and for 
two reasons: — 1st. No boy should grow up assuming 
that he can violate the order of a superior or the laws 
or conventions of polite society, and go scot-free. It 
is a great wrong to him. The rod or its equivalent de- 
scending upon him promptly before some master of 
his schoolmaster or mistress can intervene saves 
him from contempt for teacher and school. For 
this reason, the German philosopher Hegel asserted 
that the sole valid reason for punishment is to 
assert the moral law. 1 2d. Since most children go 
to school to learn, the presence of noisy or mis- 
chievous outlaws, unrebuked, in their class is an injury 
to them. To say this is not to assume that whipping 
or other corporal punishment always immediately and 
entirely cures school-boy outlawry. It seldom does so 
cure the offender. If it cured one offender in two, — if on 
the average two whippings made the bad boy good, — the 
force-theory would be the universal, unchallenged prac- 
tice. But it has no such record. Corporal punishment 
sometimes causes obedience that lasts for a day or two; 
sometimes it tides over for a season. In a few instances, 
in schools employing it as the panacea for incorrigibility, 
insubordination, disobedience, truancy, neglected home- 
lessons, class-room inattention, school-yard "fights," 
street rowdyism, failure to pass tests, low marks, cor- 

2 By the penalty, society solemnly affirms the violated principle. 
— Outlines of the Philosophy of Right. 

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CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

poral punishment effects cures. But to speak of an 
experience, on a considerable scale in one fairly large 
school, I have found in fact that save in a few unusual 
and easily recognizable cases, the remedy is worse than 
the disease. In this elementary school of a thousand 
pupils, the average number of all kinds of whippings by 
one principal in his last year of service was sixty a 
month, and the average number by the teachers was 
twenty per class-room each month, — running as high as 
ten daily in some of the intermediate grade rooms. The 
next principal completely overturned the practice; and 
for the next two years the total number, with far better 
order as the result, was eighteen cases, — an average of 
nine a year as over against an average of three to four 
thousand a year. Of course, it will be at once said that 
the earlier practice was a reign of brutality — which is 
true, for in many instances the whippings were severe 
and cruel. But the noteworthy facts were two: 1st, that 
not having a proper tenure of office, properly trained 
teachers, manual training courses, a class-room for in- 
corrigibles, and an hierarchical system of school organiza- 
tion, the second principal was forced to occasional severe 
corporal punishments; and, 2d, that by an entirely dif- 
ferent approach to the problem of order, with the same 
corps of teachers, nearly all of them habituated to the 
immediate use of the ferule upon the least suggestion of 
disorder, the second principal secured far better order 
than did the first. 

To be specific: In the latter days of the former 
regime, school- yard fights were so common, — being sev- 
eral every day, — that neighbors often had to interfere. 
In the second year of the corporal-punishment-only-in- 
exceptional - cases regime, the total number of fights 

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CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

in a school population of five hundred boys, rep- 
resenting thirty -seven different nationalities, was 
seven. 

In short, in poorly organized schools, occasional cor- 
poral punishment is a sheer necessity; but even in such 
schools, frequent punishment sets an example of force 
that both boys and girls imitate on their playgrounds, 
causes fierce hatreds of the teachers by many boys and 
girls, prevents that reverence for, even worship of, 
teachers which is the true "mother" of intellectual and 
moral progress in children, and destroys the natural 
foundation of order through rational self-control in 
later instruction in the secondary school. 

Upon the assumption that a given school-system 
cannot be reformed, — which is usually true, — the 
principles that should govern the infliction of corporal 
punishment are these — viz.: 

NEGATIVE PRINCIPLES 

First: No mode of corporal punishment should ever 
be exercised for trivial offences. 

Second: Or should ever be employed in the presence 
of other pupils unless they are joint offenders. 

Third: Or should ever be applied unequally to equal 
offenders. 

Fourth: Or should ever be applied to sick or ansBmic 
or crippled or neurasthenic boys. 

Fifth: Or should be resorted to in the cases of any 
girls of any age whatsoever either by women teachers 
or by men. 

Sixth: Or should be tried when any other available 
remedy would serve equally or nearly as well. 

12 * 163 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

AFFIRMATIVE PRINCIPLES 

First: Corporal punishment should be visited upon 
healthy, malicious boys. I. For direct defiance of 
teachers. II. For persistent and intentional disobedi- 
ence of school rules. III. For maltreatment of other 
and smaller boys. IV. For such playground offences 
as fighting, playing marbles (against orders) for money 
or any other gambling games, and blocking school-lines 
in fire-drills, or otherwise imperilling lives. 

Second: In those communities where schools are 
"looked down upon" and teachers as such are con- 
temned, corporal punishment should be visited upon 
any healthy boys who, because of this disposition of 
adults and of the consequent social atmosphere in 
their conduct or remarks, assume that teachers are 
not worthy of respect and act accordingly to the 
defeat of conscientious efforts to educate them. In 
other words, though it is highly desirable for teachers 
to rule through the willing and spontaneous obedience 
of their pupils, wanting such obedience, it is neces- 
sary for them to rule by force promptly exercised. 

The approved forms of corporal punishment are (1) 
blows on the hands by ruler or strap or switch; (2) blows 
on the thighs or legs; and (3) in the case of resistance 
to these modes, spanking by hand. When in a com- 
munity whose conditions necessitate corporal punish- 
ment, even this "last resort" fails, the next and really 
last move, suspension by teacher or principal or even 
superintendent, fails, and the lay-authorities, whether 
committee or board or school visitors, refuse to expel a 
really incorrigible offender, and such an offender returns 
to school a victor, there is but one thing for a self- 

164 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

respecting teacher to do, — immediately resign and de- 
part. Such a refusal to expel is the plainest and ugliest 
form of request to the teacher or principal or superin- 
tendent to resign; and it springs from an absolute con- 
tempt either for the personal occupant of the teaching 
office or for the office itself, or for both. 

It may perhaps be profitable to consider what the 
most successful educator of ancient days had to say 
about corporal punishment in dealing with Roman 
youth. Quintilian wrote, "But that boys should suffer 
corporal punishment, though it be a received custom, I 
by no means approve; first, because it is a disgrace and 
a punishment for slaves, and in reality — as will be evi- 
dent, if you imagine the age changed — an affront; second- 
ly, because if a boy's disposition be so abject, as not to 
be amended by reproof, he will be hardened like the 
worst of slaves, even to stripes; and lastly, because if 
one who regularly exacts his tasks be with him, there 
will not be the least need of any such chastisement. At 
present, the negligence of pedagogues [i. e., attendant 
slaves] seems to be made amends for in such a way that 
boys are not obliged to do what is right, but are pun- 
ished whenever they have not done it. Besides, after 
you have coerced a boy with stripes, how will you treat 
him when he becomes a young man, to whom such a 
terror cannot be held out, and by whom more difficult 
studies must be pursued? Add to these considerations 
that many unpleasant, even shameful things, happen 
to boys when being whipped, under the influence of 
pain or of fear; and such shame enervates and depresses 
the mind and makes them shun the sight of the people 
and feel a constant uneasiness. If, moreover, there has 
been too little care in choosing governors and tutors of 

165 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

reputable character, I am ashamed to say how scan- 
dalously unworthy men may abuse their privilege of 
punishing, and what opportunity also the terror of 
the unhappy children may sometimes afford to others. 
No man should be allowed too much authority 
over an age so weak and so unable to resist ill-treat- 
ment." * 

Century after century, the protest went up to heaven, 
perhaps from no other man more earnestly than from 
Martin Luther, who in the day of the breakup of the 
old order declared, — "Now since the young must leap 
and jump, or have something to do, because they have 
a natural desire for it which should not be restrained (for 
it is not well to check them in everything), why should 
we not provide for them such schools, and lay before 
them such studies? By the gracious provision of God, 
children take delight in acquiring knowledge, whether 
language, mathematics or history. And our schools are 
no longer a hell or purgatory in which children are tor- 
tured over cases and tenses, and in which with much 
flogging, trembling, anguish and wretchedness they 
learn nothing. The world has changed, and things go 
differently." 2 

In this changed world since the days of Quintilian 
and changed again many times since then, there are no 
slaves to be punished with blows; and we have set out 
to educate all men. Ours is indeed a new and a baffling 
problem, for school-going is no longer a privilege but is 
a compulsion, and suspensions and expulsions, instead 

1 Institutes of Oratory quoted in Painter's Great Pedagogical 
Essays. 90 a.d. 

2 Letter to the Mayors and Aldermen of all the cities of Germany 
in behalf of Christian schools. 1524. 

166 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

of causing sorrow, cause in some youthful breasts a 
sense of relief and of pleasure. 

Once the world was content to educate the strong 
and brilliant and well-favored; now we propose to 
educate the mediocre, the dull, even the feeble-minded 
and the defective. Moreover, we have given over the 
control of education in the free public State-supported 
schools to the democracy. Small wonder then that not 
everywhere can we place the enlightened teacher in 
attractive surroundings with ample equipment and 
authority to educate. We have tried to build our 
educational Rome in a day; and we have almost suc- 
ceeded. Perhaps our new city will rise complete before 
many years. 

But already there are communities where school 
government by good teaching is possible; and in such 
communities, the better system of managing boys and 
girls as individuals and in classes should be installed. 
This system involves certain points, which should be 
set forth. 

First: Better is complete obedience slowly won than 
prompt obedience at heart sullen. 

Second: Better is unconscious and spontaneous obedi- 
ence than any other kind. 

Third: Better is even somewhat imperfect obedience 
that nevertheless issues from admiration for the teacher 
as one who never gets angry and is always patient, 
reasonable and kind than outwardly perfect obedience 
when in the soul of the pupil is the conviction that he 
or she is only bigger, stronger and of higher authority 
(as a grown-up) than the small person can be. 

There are two ways to break horses. One is to let 
the colt run the range until pretty well grown and then 

167 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

to "bust" him, — with lasso, curb-bit, rowel-and-spur, 
nail-studded pigskin lash, loaded saddle, with thumbs 
gouging eyes and straps suffocating the throat, with 
ropes hobbling the feet, and straps circling the chest. 
The colt can be broken so — sometimes it kills, often it 
ruins the spirit forever. It is a quick process, with 
immediate victory or defeat. 

The other way to break a colt is to lead him with the 
halter when he is little, to pat and to pet him, to make 
him slowly bridlewise, to befriend him with blanket in cold 
weather, with a lump of sugar or bunch of clover, to 
train him a little at a time regularly; in short, not to 
break him at all, but to instruct and to educate him. 
Most of our best horses come into harness or under sad- 
dle gently. Voice and whip to them are signals of pur- 
pose, not commands of violence. Few horses " school- 
trained to the eight gaits" were ever taught by blows 
to know their masters. Most good horses were brought 
up, as it were, by hand; they were not allowed to grow 
up and then smashed, beaten, broken into submission. 
They learned their good manners from civilized, patient, 
intelligent, kind and well-mannered men. In this re- 
spect, many stock farms in Virginia, in Kentucky and in 
Iowa are decidedly superior to some schools in our land. 

Logic and literary custom, sound philosophy and 
ordinary common sense require that, in most cases, one 
should discuss the theory of a matter first and later 
present its mechanical features. But such is the prej- 
udice of many of our citizens and indeed of many of 
our teachers that one who undertakes first to discuss 
the virtues of our human nature and thereby to disclose 
that the best means of developing those virtues are not 
corporal punishments and other penalties can get little 

168 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

or no hearing. But let us now proceed openly and can- 
didly to consider definitely what we wish our boys and 
girls to become as men and women. What are the moral 
aims of education? Let us consider this question con- 
cretely with reference to individuals. 

Evidently the moral aims of education may be stated 
in pairs — viz.: 

I. (1) To preserve the best natural qualities of each 
individual. 
(2) To develop other good qualities in him. 
II. (1) To eradicate the worst natural qualities. 

(2) To inhibit the development of other bad 
qualities. 

III. (1) To make him useful to himself. 

(2) To make him useful to others and to society. 

IV. (1) To make it safe for him to venture out into 

life; i. e., to equip him to make a living. 
(2) To make it safe for society to receive him; 
i. e., to teach him a livelihood that is at least 
not injurious to others. 
V. (1) To teach him to respect himself. 

(2) To teach him to think modestly of himself, 
VI. (1) To develop in him self-reliance and freedom. 
(2) To develop in him much respect and distinct 
sympathy for others. 
VII. (1) To make of him one who fears God. 

(2) To make also of him one who loves God. 
VIII. (1) To give him bodily health, when he has it not, 
and to preserve it in him, when he has it. 
(2) To give him wisdom. 

This is by no means an all-inclusive or exhaustive 
list; but it is of sufficient length to illustrate the point 
that education seeks always a reconciliation between 

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CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

apparent opposites or at least unrelated extremes. It 
is not so much "the golden means" of Aristotle, as the 
unity of life, taught by Jesus. That golden means 
affirmed things in this fashion — viz.: 

One extreme is timidity, the mean is courage, the 
other extreme is foolhardiness. One extreme is parsi- 
mony, the middle is generosity, the other extreme is 
wastefulness. Virtue is not the opposite extreme of 
vice, but a moderation between reason and appetite, 
the soul in man and the brute in him. 

What Jesus saw was that in truth we get one of the 
pair by seeking the other or to avoid the other, as the 
case may be: who seeks health gets wisdom, who seeks 
wisdom gets health: who loses his life saves it, who 
would save it loses it. It is a doctrine indeed difficult, 
to be understood only in parables. But it distinctly 
concerns every educator of youth. 

Part of the difficulty that our teachers encounter in 
the work of educator proceeds from our failure to ob- 
serve these several facts and principles of human 
nature — viz. : 

1. We take no merit of our qualities as such, though we 
may indeed take demerits of them. One who is by nature 
frank, open, and certain deserves no credit therefor: this 
is a quality in him, and no virtue. And yet one who by 
nature is secret, silent, uncertain deserves and gets censure 
therefor. It seems illogical, but it is a fact. A quality is 
no virtue, and yet may be a vice. 

2. We may appear to take merit of our qualities when it 
is labor and anxiety to maintain them. And yet in truth 
the merit is not in the qualities but in the integrity or unity 
of character, the force, the struggle against their overthrow. 

3. Every quality has its defect : the quality may be good, 

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CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

and yet the defect may be evil. Frankness is good, but the 
defect of frankness is indifference to the feelings of others. 
Truthfulness is good, yet it works — how often! — ruin to 
oneself and to others. Loyalty is the capsheaf of all the 
virtues, yet one may be loyal to a false principle or to a 
traitorous leader. Courage is the seed of all the virtues in 
men, yet it has sent many to the deserved doom of properly 
"lost causes." 

4. We human beings would be in hard case were there 
not some solution of the enigma. Aristotle found the solu- 
tion in "the golden mean." Jesus found it in "seeking." * 
According to the Master Teacher, virtue is at the point of 
strain. One deserves credit for making and enduring stress. 
The strain and stress come at the focal point of the unity 
between apparent opposites. You and the neighbor are 
not one, but different. Treat him like yourself. You seek 
the kingdom? It is within you. We owe debts to God 
and to men: let us forgive the debts due to ourselves and 
so be ourselves forgiven. The future appears worrisome: 
consider the evil of to-day. In fact, men see nearly always 
the wrong thing! We praise men and things for their 
qualities that are good, and fail to condemn our own selves 
for not getting rid of the qualities in ourselves that are 
vicious; yet a good quality is not a virtue but only God's 
gift. In getting rid of a bad quality, do it thoroughly. Be 
born again. It is not enough to wash the outside of the 
platter or to whiten sepulchres. Hypocrites are "as graves 
that appear not." 

It is a striking item of the evidence of the unity of 
mind that all of us agree that to do right is virtue. Now 
"to do right" involves what we must call intellectual 

1 " He that seeketh findeth." " Love your enemies." " The Son 
of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost." 

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CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

operations, moral energy, and emotional relations. We 
must know the right, will to do it, and do it joyously. 
Nearly always to do right concerns others. And it is 
a striking confirmation of the theory here presented 
again, — for it is not new but the essence of historic 
religion, — that to do right is never easy. When there 
is no opposition within or without us, neither we our- 
selves nor any others ever think of noticing that we are 
doing right. In other words, one does right or wrong 
always at some point of personal and inner or of social 
and outer stress or strain. 

It is a subtle doctrine, the outcome of which is con- 
sidered educationally precisely this. — All the glory is in 
the striving to overcome. " I have fought a good fight: 
I have kept the faith"; and what is the crown? It is 
a crown of more life, more opportunities to fight for the 
faith, — that, not less, not other. It follows inerrantly 
that much of the old familiar talk of our schools about 
the virtues will not stand the test. We must sift the 
things that are really good out from the rest; and every 
one of these good things, be it known, is some mode of 
endeavor, every one. In this scale, to the naturally 
cheerful, good-natured boy comes not a word of praise 
for his kindheartedness and sunshine; yet to the boy 
who is naturally gloomy and unsympathetic but who 
has set out to win a better nature, all praise. How 
often the neat and tidy girl is conscious of the unkempt 
and untidy! Her virtue is not in the neatness and 
tidiness, but it may yet be in her effort to think kindly of 
and to help those who are not like herself. That prayer 
— "I thank God I am not as other men are!" is precisely 
the most wicked of all attitudes. The thrifty should 
pray for generosity, the courageous for caution; the 

172 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

materialist for vision and the dreamer for good sense; 
and all for charity. 

And the place for inculcating all these endeavors to 
change and to cleanse and to progress is in our schools. 
In developing and testing virtue, we should set aside 
in our minds these prescriptive hierarchies of the 
qualities; — punctuality, regularity, promptness, silence, 
obedience to teachers and to rules, kindness, self-reliance, 
social S}mipathy, cleanliness, orderliness, neatness and 
tidiness, accuracy, thoroughness, frankness, sincerity, 
consistency, courage, fortitude, industry, justice, truth- 
fulness, temperance, nobility, honor, loyalty, economy, 
patriotism, foresight, prudence — there are two hundred of 
them easily distinguishable — ; and fix our minds resolutely 
upon the fact that all virtue consists in endeavor to attain 
without hypocrisy such qualities as we do not yet 
have, and to maintain those good qualities that the 
" world " would destroy. How hard and base is the man 
who has all the best of these qualities, — with no desire 
for yet more! And yet baser is one who surrenders his 
integrity of soul when the battle goes hard against him. 

In the light of this argument, it is plain enough that 
we are not to be greatly concerned over incentives to 
virtue. Prizes that lead us to seek knowledge and skill 
not for themselves but as means to other ends; privileges 
that lift us to special rank among our fellows; immuni- 
ties for ourselves that mark our former equals as in- 
feriors; fear of blows, of disgrace, or of other penalties; 
desire of honors; hope of future good: — all these things, 
it is now quite evident, can only thwart the true pur- 
pose of school discipline, which is to make of the boy 
something better than he now is and better than he 
would probably be without that discipline. To attain 

173 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

such an ideal, there is but one and only way, — the 
self-activity of the boy. 

We may be compelled by some external exigency, for 
want of time or more probably for want of patience in 
ourselves or sometimes for want of sufficient intelligence 
in the boy or otherwise, to induce him violently to sub- 
mission and quiet, — for the sake of other boys and girls. 
Not once in a thousand times do we punish his body by 
blows or by detentions or his spirit by sarcasms or other- 
wise — for the sake of that very boy. And yet the bad 
boy who is satisfied with his qualities, good and 
bad, — all such are bad and only such are bad — is the 
very boy for whom all these theories and practices of 
school discipline have been devised. 

The skill-theory of school control involves knowing 
one's boys and girls. With such knowledge, merely by 
seating them with due relation to one another and to 
the teacher, nearly all school-room disorder in an aver- 
age class may be omitted. These are some of the prin- 
ciples — viz.: 

1. The vain boy or girl, who misbehaves in order to ap- 
pear a hero or heroine before the schoolmates, should be 
put into the rear corner seat. Such a pupil is usually ideo- 
motor (with long, narrow face and slender body). 

2. The sneaking sly pupil who renders eye-service but 
misbehaves when "teacher isn't looking" belongs in the 
front seat nearest to the teacher's desk. Such a pupil also 
is usually of the nervous or ideo-motor type. 

3. Never put a good girl in front of a bad boy, but 
preferably at his back. 

4. In mixed classes, it is usually best to put the sexes 
in alternate files or rows; but the rule need not be rigid. 

5. As the eye does not catch movements in the crowded 

174 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

center of the picture quite so well as at front and sides, and 
as there are more temptations to disorder at the center of 
the room, it is usually wise to put the merely restless pupils 
in the front row or in the side files. 

6. Do not shame a bad boy by putting him where there 
are four girls at front, back, and sides; but when possible, 
isolate him with a vacant seat in front and good boys 
around him. A bad boy does not yet clearly see himself 
as he is but is secretly or openly self-satisfied. His curse 
is pride. 

7. Muscular-motor boys (with square faces and strong 
bodies) may be presumed to be orderly boys in conduct. 
The speculative boys (with triangular faces and slender 
bodies) may be presumed to be thoughtful boys in conduct 
but not very useful in stimulating other boys to loyalty to 
teacher and school. Their day of personal leadership, if it 
ever comes, lies years and years ahead. The vital, corpu- 
lent, cheerful boys may be presumed to be indolent and in- 
different. Do not put two of them in juxtaposition. 

8. It is not wise to offer good seats as rewards of orderly 
behavior. It is not right indeed to offer any rewards of 
any kind for orderly behavior. This defeats virtue by 
giving a false aim to endeavor. 

9. While it is expedient not to seat in juxtaposition any 
two pupils who cordially dislike one another or are mu- 
tually antipathetic, it is equally inexpedient to set chums 
in such contiguity as facilitates whispering, fond glances, 
and the passing of notes. 

10. Reseat once a month, " playing no favorites." 
Whether each pupil should have a new seat will depend 
upon many conditions. When all seats are well-lighted and 
there is no " cold corner" in winter, with a class not troubled 
with an exceeding number of disorderly boys and with girls 
who whisper, such monthly reseating need not be complete. 

11. Sometimes a beneficial change, not obvious to the 

175 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

teacher to whom the class-room scene is familiar, will be 
discovered at once by the principal or by a fellow-teacher. 
Let some one else by invitation look over the room. Per- 
haps he or she will see a near-sighted or slightly deaf boy or 
girl who belongs "up front"; or an overgrown pupil who 
belongs in the rear of the room. 

In order of consideration next after correct seating 
of the pupils is their proper arrangement in the march- 
ing lines. It is the custom to arrange the boys strictly 
in order of height and the girls likewise, with the short- 
est boy and girl leading their respective lines. Often, 
this custom may well be ignored. Sometimes, the order 
should be exactly reversed. Sometimes, the lines 
should be broken into groups. But whatever be the 
marching order, every pupil should know his number 
and place; and report in it accordingly. It is desirable 
to place the control of the lines as much as possible 
under their leaders, for the teacher has many other 
duties at the times before and after school and at re- 
cesses besides seeing that the lines move promptly, 
regularly, and smoothly. 

For the control of the class in its movements in group 
or as individuals when changing from one recitation to 
another or to a study period, — putting books away, 
handling papers, going to the blackboard, going on er- 
rands to the teacher's desk, to the dictionary, to the 
waste-basket, to the supply-closet or out of the room, — 
it is expedient to discover the golden mean between too 
many formalities and the freedom that in children and 
youth soon becomes license. How formal the teacher 
should be depends partly upon temperament and upon 
experience and yet mainly upon the class itself. 

176 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

Two principles are, however, discernible: — 

First: Begin with at least as much of formal system 
as is likely to be required at any time later. It is 
easier to relax from severity than to stiffen and to 
straighten up from slovenliness and slouching. Especial- 
ly should young and relatively inexperienced teachers 
begin with sufficient rigorousness. 

Second: Keep at least enough of the formalities to 
train the pupils to orderly group-action. The habit of 
working in step with one's fellows is, in itself, a valu- 
able and educative acquisition especially in a relatively 
free democracy such as ours. 

Among the devices sometimes of value are such as 
these — viz. : 

I. Changing recitations (for class or section or group). 

1. One tap of bell (or similar signal). Close books. 

2. Two taps. Put books away. 

3. Three taps. Take out new books, place on desk and 
set in order. 

4. One tap. All attention, — recitation begins. 

II. Errands out of room. 

On leaving, pupil writes name on blackboard, with 
time of exit. On returning, adds time of return — e. g.: 

Charles Wilson 10:05 A.M. 10:09 A.M. 

At the end of the school-day, the teacher then has a 
record of all such cases. 

Teachers should not go into details as to why the 

child cares to leave the room. No two boys of the same 

room should be allowed to be absent at the same time, 

save in exceptional circumstances. But permission to 

go should otherwise invariably be granted. In case the 

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CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

teacher suspects that this universal privilege is being 
abused, inquiry may be made of parents; and upon 
proof, the time lost may be made up after school double 
or treble or be atoned for by some extra task. 

III. Passing papers forward for inspection by the 
teacher. 

1. Order the pupils in each file to pass their papers for- 
ward to the front. 

2. Appoint the first pupil in one of the outside files of 
desks as monitor to collect the papers, and to place them 
on the teacher's desk. 

IV. Blackboard work. 

1. Count off nine pupils — 1,2,3, — 1,2,3, — 1,2,3, — and 
assign to each pupil numbered "1" the first problem, to 
those numbered "2" the second, etc., and have them place 
themselves at the blackboard in due alternation. (Or 
count off twelve pupils and assign four different problems, 
similarly.) 

2. Give the same problems to the pupils of the class re- 
maining at their desks, appointing some to follow those 
numbered "1" at the blackboard, others those numbered 
"2," etc. 

Straggling back and forth from desk to board should be 
corrected, and a suitable time-limit set. 

V. The fire-drill. 

Twice in my immediate school experience, school 
panics have been saved. Once, a fire actually broke 
out, from a match thrown by a careless pupil under a 
wainscoting. In this instance, the drill worked per- 
fectly; and, by a telephone message to fire quarters, 
the building was saved with but slight loss. 

Upon the other occasion, four street gamins just be- 

178 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

yond the compulsory school age came into a very large 
building at night, with the assembly hall on the third 
floor densely thronged. They put out all the lights on 
the lower floors, rang the fire-gong, and yelled "Fire!" 
intending to stampede the audience. They did stam- 
pede some sixty adults; but the children duly formed 
quietly in drill-lines, checked the other adults thereby, 
and gave the principal of the school a chance to explain 
in clarion tones that there was really no fire. In other 
words, the cry of "Fire!" would have stampeded the 
entire audience; but the very fire-signal, meant to 
arouse the crowd to panic, automatically suggested 
order to the pupils. 

In preparing for fire-drills, the following suggestions 
may be useful — viz.: 

A. Let every door of exit and on the way thereto have a 
proper tender, — usually two tenders. 

B. Let every line know by information and by drill just 
the course it is to take out of the building. 

C. So organize the lines that there will be a safe order of 
precedence. 

D. In a school-house with two stairways, drill for all to go 
down one way or all the other; with three stairways, all 
down the three or two or one; etc. 

E. Until the habit is fixed, drill at least three times a 
week, then twice or three times each month. 

F. Use otherwise unusual and yet fixed gong signals ; as, 
two strokes, pause, two strokes, for one kind of exit; two, 
pause, four, for another kind. (It is best to have a dif- 
ferent sounding gong for fire-drills from that used for reci- 
tations. When electric signals are used, these should be 
sounded with unmistakable counts; as, one, pause, three, 
pause, two, etc.). 

13 179 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

G. Slow-walking dismissals, not over two lines to a stair- 
way, make the best standard drills. Mere speed is not 
requisite. 

A panic is worse than a fire. 1 The main purpose of 
the drill is to avoid the panic; the purpose is not merely 
to escape from the building. 

Upon this skill- theory of school government, there is 
a bearing of another matter even more important than 
a clear understanding of the mechanics of school routine. 
Some teachers are greatly disturbed by trivial disorders 
in their recitations, especially at the beginning. This 
disturbance is in themselves rather than in the pupils, 
for poised and deliberate teachers ignore all trivial dis- 
orders and proceed trusting to the interest to be aroused 
in the topic to bring the entire room to the desirable 
quiet and attention. There are but three exceptions to 
the general principle: — Ignore trivial disorders. The 
first exception is unless it seems likely to develop into 
larger disorder; the second is unless it seems to be a 
deliberate attempt to start general disorder; and the 
third is unless the pupil guilty of the disorder is one who 
so needs reproof on the spot, because of a general ten- 
dency to make trouble, as to warrant setting aside the 
immediate good of the class as a whole, through pro- 
ceeding with the recitation, as to warrant the delay of 
a prompt and adequate reproof. The judgment of teach- 
ers is tested often upon this kind of situation. 

The foregoing discussion of the mechanics of skilful 
class organization and management shows how neces- 

1 New school-houses should be as nearly panic-proof as they are fire- 
proof. To be panic-proof, they need adequate but not too wide halls 
and stairways. Wide halls and dark, narrow stairs with small doors 
make a dangerous combination. 

180 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

sary it is that the teacher shall know his pupils, his 
subjects, and the technique of teaching. 1 In all open- 
ness of mind, let us agree that teachers who really know 
their children, — their homes, their powers and weak- 
nesses, their tendencies, interests, fears, dispositions, — 
who really know their subjects in their general scope 
and in their details, and who have seriously considered 
how best to present these subjects to these very pupils, 
will be so full of their themes and of a sense of the needs 
of their pupils that it will take rather serious disorders 
to turn them aside from their proposed lessons. And 
yet it will not do to proceed to impart knowledge in a 
roomful of a buzzing confusion of noises and move- 
ments. Here, as it usually is in practical matters, the 
middle course is right because it is wise. 

The home-and-school theory of school discipline as- 
sumes that the true center of interest for the child is in 
the home. In the cases of homes of culture, of family 
affection, and of economic opportunity, this is the fact. 
But such homes in many cities are no longer the com- 
mon lot of children and of youth. In most cases in 
city schools, teachers may find in this theory — that the 
center of gravity in the child's life is outside of the 
school sphere — rather aggravation than assistance. In 
these times, most parents do not care to help their chil- 

1 "Let us now speak of the manner of teaching and imparting 
them (songs and melodies and rhythms), and the persons to whom, 
and the times when, they are severally to be imparted. As the 
shipwright first lays down the lines of the keel, and draws the design 
in outline, so do I seek to distinguish the patterns of life, and lay 
down their keels according to the nature of different men's souls; 
seeking truly to consider by what means, and in what ways, we 
may go best through the voyage of life." — Plato, The Laios, Book 
VII. 

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CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

dren with home lessons or to punish them for dis- 
obedience or other misconduct at school, but resent 
throwing any burdens from the school into the home. 
Such parents as are honestly desirous of lending their 
aid to help the children at school should be called upon 
to do so in whatever ways seem open to the teacher. 

To illustrate: — The boy is constantly restless and natu- 
rally inattentive in school; and the expostulations of the 
parents at home are of no avail, partly because they do not 
understand what the school-room requirements are and 
wherein their boy fails. With some parents, an accepted 
invitation to spend a day at school observing the regular 
routine opens their eyes marvellously. What they discover 
is not that their boy is restless and inattentive, which they 
probably knew, but that he doesn't care to change his dis- 
position and conduct in this respect, — in short, that he is 
not simply "a trial" to his teacher because these qualities 
disturb the class-room but that he is bad in himself in that he 
is proud of his qualities and self-satisfied. 

Again: — The pupil, — usually a boy, sometimes a girl, — 
shirks the home lessons, asserting either that none are as- 
signed or that " they're easy, and I've already done them." 
In such a case, either send a note to the home (perhaps by 
mail or by a different pupil) or ask one of the parents to call 
at the school to talk over the matter. 

A third instance: — The pupil has exceptional talent, — as 
in drawing or in music or in history, — such talent as is not 
sufficiently exercised in the school treatment. Here, by in- 
forming the parents of the fact, they may be able to give to 
him private lessons or to buy books of especial value for his 
library or otherwise to develop him as his gift warrants. 

A fourth instance: — The converse of the above is true, 
and the pupil has some special defects, for the remedying or 
relief of which the aid of the parent may be invoked. The 

182 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

defects of school-children are many and various, often 
subtle. The entire subject, here suggested, is sufficient in 
itself to employ the energies of a teacher for a lifetime of 
investigation. Each one of them indeed is the subject of 
the life-study of many specialists. The class teacher even 
in cities with medical inspectors and with examining oculists, 
aurists, anthropometrists, alienists, and expert physical and 
other supervisors still needs to know the superficial signs 
and evidences of such defects as are suggested as fol- 
lows — viz.: 

I. Eyesight: A. Near-sightedness. This displays it- 
self in the inability of the pupil to read print or to draw 
objects held at a distance. The normal distance for 
reading 11-point type (the main type of this book) is 
eighteen inches. 1 The effects of near-sightedness not 
corrected early in life by proper eye-glasses — to be pre- 
scribed by an oculist (an eye-doctor, not an optician) — 
are morbidness, narrowness of mental vision, physical 
inactivity in outdoor exercises, and usually an incurable 
selfishness. 

B. Far-sightedness. One who is far-sighted does not 
see small objects near at hand clearly. Reading causes 
headaches and irritableness, and becomes irksome. 
The effects of far-sightedness not corrected early in life 
by proper eye-glasses are (1) dislike of study and all other 
school work that requires close attention; (2) superficial- 
ity of mental vision; (3) an unusual interest in outdoor 

1 Often, I have seen teachers test this not by measuring off 
eighteen inches but by holding a book at the right distance for them- 
selves, being totally unaware that they themselves were either far- 
sighted or near-sighted. "Man is the measure of all things/' said 
Pythagoras. "I am a man," therefore, "I am the measure of all 
things," is their naive "pragmatic" philosophy. 

183 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

games; and (4) often lack of persistence with scattering 
of interests. 

C. Astigmatism. One with astigmatic eyes does 
not see straight lines. His visual images are crooked. 
There is also an unevenness of light, some parts of the 
images being too bright, others gray, even black. Serious 
astigmatism makes good school work impossible. It 
impedes reading, compels poor handwriting, causes 
" nervousness" and self-distrust. When not corrected 
early in life, astigmatism causes in the youth who nev- 
ertheless persists in study nervous exhaustion, even 
insanity. 

D. Esophoria, exophoria, hyperphoria, and similar 
maladjustments of the eye muscles. In these cases, 
the eyes do not focus naturally at the normal distance 
of eighteen inches; but either too near, or too far away, 
or not at all. When not corrected either by prismatic 
lenses or by surgical operations, in nearly all cases, the 
sight of one or the other eye is lost. Few persons have 
eyes with equal powers of vision, one usually being 
stronger than the other. These defects of crossed, or 
wall, or oblique eyes, — or tendencies thereto, which 
cause excessive physical strain, — are without respect to 
the choice of the eye; and it is quite as common to lose 
the sight of the better eye as of the worse because of 
these external eye-muscle maladjustments. 

Class teachers do well to remember that scientific 
tests of over 2,300,000 pupils show that 34 per cent, of 
them suffer from eye defects. In a class of fifty pupils, 
on the average, seventeen require eye-glasses or eye 
operations. The cemeteries, the insane asylums, the 
jails, the menial walks of life, the ranks of day-laborers 
get most of their recruits from the boys and girls whose 

184 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

eyes were defective from birth. To wear correct glasses 
is for them redemption from the curse of not being able 
truly to see the world. 

II. Hearing: A. Deafness. Serious deafness requires 
medical attention immediately upon its discovery: 
slight deafness usually also. About four children in 
one hundred are "hard of hearing." This defect is 
usually greater in one ear than in the other. Deafness 
leads to inattention and to indifference to others, and 
limits the avenues of knowledge. The seriously deaf 
are seldom ambitious of success, and therefore require 
especial encouragement. Ear-drums and speaking-tubes, 
under medical direction, help obviate some of the worst 
probably ultimate results. Outdoor life, by improving 
the quality of the blood, sometimes helps to recovery or 
to betterment. 

B. Head noises. These often occur in pupils with un- 
usually acute hearing. They are sometimes caused by 
growths or deposits in the inner ear, more often by 
anaemia or other ill-health. Sometimes, they are the 
advance signals of approaching insanity. Children so 
afflicted are at times irritable and restless, at other 
times dull and listless; at all times, inattentive and in- 
clined to day-dreaming. All sounds come to them from 
the outside world in false confusions, mixed with under- 
and overtones mostly discordant. Children of this kind 
are to be pitied, encouraged and helped. 

III. Spinal curvatures. These afflict especially boys 
and girls of ideo-motor and speculative temperaments. 
Spinal curvatures and weaknesses are very common 
among city children whose ancestry has been from gen- 
erations of the city poor: they are much less common 
among rural children and among the city well-to-do. 

185 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Serious cases are easily recognized. But slight cases 
grow often into serious ones. Any spinal curvature 
interferes more or less with the spinal cord and its 
efferent and afferent nerves and hence with the health- 
ful life of the body, — its digestion and other processes. 
We Americans are the only people in human history 
who have undertaken to sit up or to stand up continu- 
ously for sixteen hours a day; hence, spinal curvatures 
are rapidly increasing among us. The spine was built 
for quadrupeds: it is not properly built for use as 
eighteen-hour-a-day bipeds: it is not anatomically a 
vertical tower but a horizontal bridge. Adults should 
lie down flat for an hour every day about midday; 
and children even more than adults. Of course, we 
cannot now at once correct this entirely unhygienic 
long-hours high-pressure day for our people. But we 
can as teachers help somewhat to relieve the cases of 
the pupils whose spines are already giving way. 

Any spinal curvature causes weakness and makes the 
person prone to fatigue and exhaustion, — to impatience, 
restlessness, distress, and allied supposedly moral de- 
ficiencies. 

IV. Innutrition and malnutrition. Innutrition may 
arise from insufficiency of food in quality or in quantity 
or in both respects. It may arise from weakness of the 
digestive organs. It may arise from impairment of the 
nervous system. Its familiar and general result is 
anaemia, which displays itself in the blood in that it 
has too few red or too few white corpuscles or both and 
in the tissues which become or are congenitally weak, 
pale and flaccid. Even the bones may be soft, for want 
of lime; or brittle, for want of tissue of protein or al- 
buminous substance. There are usually other results 

186 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

such as defective special senses, weak reactions, inert- 
ness, timidity. 

Malnutrition displays itself in derangement of func- 
tions in skin, in special senses, in the respiratory, circu- 
latory, digestive, excretory, muscular, lymphatic, cere- 
bral and sympathetic nervous systems. The functional 
disorders of the system that is suffering from mal- 
nutrition are such as require the immediate attention 
of physicians. Some of the secondary psychical results 
of malnutrition are irascibility, insubordinateness, fear, 
sullenness. 

The ignorant rich or well-to-do are as liable to both 
innutrition and malnutrition as are the intelligent poor. 

V. Teeth deficiencies. A. Caries. Few children and 
youth have sound teeth. In any public school any- 
where, most of the children are in need of dentistry. In 
many public schools, ninety-five children in one hundred 
are in need of tooth filling or of tooth extraction. In 
some instances even in children of but ten or twelve 
years of age, nearly every permanent tooth is already 
in a state of decay. Toothache at school is very com- 
mon. Many times, disorderly children are punished 
when pain in their teeth is the cause of their disorder. 

B. Irregular dentition. Sometimes, the teeth do not 
strike together, and food cannot be properly masti- 
cated. In one of my classes, I discovered a child with 
over forty teeth, sixteen of them very large, and several 
in the center of the upper mouth! This child had been 
the subject of frequent rebuke from his teacher for 
mumbling his words and for defective articulation. A 
glance into this extraordinary mouth told the story of 
the cause. Our schools require dentists even more than 
oculists for semiannual inspection and advice to parents. 

187 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

VI. The crippled. The disabled and the maimed 
come to us in all shapes and with all kinds of troubles. 
Each is a special case. Nearly all of them are sensitive 
and on the defensive, and yet they are usually ambitious 
beyond the average pupils. Each should be the special 
care of the class teacher. One of their common char- 
acteristics is a certain deceitfulness that is due to fear 
of injustice. Their treatment should be kind, frank, 
just. They do not desire obvious pity, though by no 
means resenting a tender, reticent, deeply concerned 
compassionateness. 

VII. The feeble-minded. Of these, we have several 
grades, — 1. Dull or feeble of intellect or will. 2. Chor- 
eatic or epileptic. 3. Partially deranged. 4. Imbecile. 
5. Idiot. None of them belongs in any public school 
unless in some class especially arranged for the feeble- 
minded. When any one of these kinds is present and 
in the actual operation of the school must be retained, 
a problem of intense seriousness to the teacher, to the 
classmates, to the parents of the case in question and 
to the parents of all the other pupils is presented. They 
are born to all classes of our people, of all the various 
nationalities and races and religions. Those of the 
four kinds, — second to fifth, — may be recognized almost 
or indeed actually on sight by their characteristic and 
well-known stigmata, which therefore need not be 
enumerated here. Before deciding that a pupil is really 
dull or feeble-minded, — of the first kind, — the teacher 
may make four simple tests, as follows — viz.: 

1. Time-rate. Dictate making of twenty marks, 1, 1, etc. 
A child of this kind will either make them very, very slowly 
or wrongly before completing the number. 

188 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

2. Field of vision. Make five dots on the blackboard, 
and erase. Ask the child to record them on blackboard or 
on paper accordingly. The dull or feeble child never really 
sees five dots. 

3. Retentiveness. Say a few words carefully. Pause 
30 seconds. Ask the child to repeat them. 

4. Execution of order. Draw a rectangle on a piece of 
manila paper; then cut it out with scissors. Hand paper, 
pencil (or crayon) and scissors to the child; and ask him 
to do the same. 

The boy or girl who can perform any three of these 
tests fairly well is probably not, in fact, feeble-minded. 
He or she who fails in three or all of these tests probably 
is feeble-minded. In order to avoid criticism by the 
ignorant public or by the interested parents or by the 
school authorities at the end of the year for not passing 
the dull or feeble-minded child forward to the next 
class, it is expedient to give one's own opinion on the 
case as early after receiving him or her as one forms 
that opinion. 

VIII. Special deficiencies in functioning, or in the sev- 
eral studies. These occur in Protean forms. One child 
cannot write evenly and legibly; another cannot spell; 
another is foiled by arithmetic; a fourth has no verbal 
memory; a fifth is prone to giggling or other minor 
hysterical or " nervous" displays; a sixth "hates" 
music; a seventh is so slow in obeying any order as to 
seem defiant when really he simply cannot react prompt- 
ly to orders conveyed through his auditory tract; an 
eighth is always drawing something openly or clandes- 
tinely; a ninth is tardy because he has no adequate sense 
of time or of space or of either; a tenth whispers auto- 
matically and is scarcely aware of this breach of school 

189 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

decorum when committed; an eleventh is impolite, being 
unconscious of others; a twelfth pilfers, being without 
the property sense. " There is none good, no, not one," 
— is almost true of every class of forty students in 
America. Scarcely one in forty is wholly good. Often 
conferences with parents help. The only good boy is 
the one who knows that he is not good but is trying 
to do better. 

For the fourth theory of government at school, — and 
the last to be considered here, — we must look to the 
modern doctrines of democracy for justification. Ac- 
cording to democratic theories and practices "no per- 
son may govern another without that person's, con- 
sent," * and "all men are created equal." 2 Democracy 
is the rule of all by the majority, — as every one knows. 
But an ancient authority 3 showed of all governments, 
that even of a democracy, two facts are true: First, 
the government is always operated by individuals; and, 
second, these rulers are usually the older men of the 
nation or community. The supporters of this new 
theory of pupil self-government set up in addition the 
familiar propositions that school is preparation for life 
and that the true way of preparation is trial and ex- 
periment. From these five premises follows the final 
conclusion that the true way to prepare for life in a 
democracy is to constitute in the school a democracy in 
which a majority of the pupils (duly organized in some 
form of representative government) control all of them. 
In order not to transgress the obvious common sense 

1 Abraham Lincoln, Lincoln-Douglas Debates: frequently re- 
peated by him. 

2 Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence. 

3 Aristotle, On Politics, Book VIII. 

190 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

of the situation, in college, in high school, in academy 
and in elementary school alike, they have a court of 
appeal whose justices are the adult teachers. 

To condemn at once pupil self-government in its 
theory and in its practice, without calling before the 
bar some actual " school cities' ' and " junior republics" 
and "students' senates" might be pedantic dogmatism; 
and to discuss the theory and practice adequately in 
these pages would be to increase them to double their 
number. Let me give, first, my own opinion after some 
trial and much observation. — Under the right college 
president or school principal, with competent professors 
or teachers friendly to the experiment, in certain kinds 
of neighborhoods, the theory when not pressed too hard 
works reasonably well alike for all ages of students. 
Not gainsaying this fact or desiring to see these experi- 
ments fail and cease, I would, second, offer a few sug- 
gestions as to some of the principles of ethics essentially 
involved in this matter of school discipline. The gen- 
eral stages of growth in morality (to promote which 
growth is the educational purpose of school government) 
are three — viz.: 

1 . obedience to persons and to their definite orders ; 

2. obedience to maxims, laws, customs; and 

3. obedience to principles and to reason. 

The first stage may be characterized as that of "pre- 
scriptive morality"; the second as that of "doctrinal 
morality"; and the third as that of "rational con- 
duct." Hitherto, educators have assumed that the 
age-period of the first kind of obedience ends at the 
end of childhood and the beginning of, adolescence; 
that the second kind characterizes the entire period of 

191 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

adolescence; and that adults should be emancipated 
from personal authority and from formal laws and "do 
their duty" of desire and of intelligence and of their 
own good character. Obviously, pupil self-government 
assumes that humanity has no lesson for the individual 
and that he can skip from obedience to parents at home 
to the third stage, omitting the half-period of obedience 
to teachers and the entire period of obedience to the set 
"rules and regulations" of the schools. This may be 
true. If so, the American boy is abridging the experi- 
ence of the race, short-circuiting human history; per- 
haps, he inherits democracy in his brain cells from his 
self-governing parents. It is a question of fact, to be 
scientifically determined by systematic trial, experi- 
mentation, generalization, correction of error, and veri- 
fication. If, as a matter of fact, American school and 
college students can beneficially govern themselves by 
electing their own rulers and police, an educational revo- 
lution is at hand too vast and momentous for farther 
discussion here. On the other hand, if "school-cities/' 
— and their similars, — by the omission of a necessary 
social indoctrination gradually into the approved modes 
of conduct of adults mean that the "letter of the laws" 
shall not be known perfectly by a considerable number 
of our citizens, we shall find ourselves in such a welter 
of persons at tangential and oblique angles of relation 
to one another as amounts to chaos and would inevit- 
ably end in the ruin of society. Here again we come 
upon two questions of fact: 1. Does or does not pupil 
self-government mean the abandonment of social in- 
doctrination in common customs for the pupil citizens? 
2. Even though it be true, in a sense, that the voice of 
the (adult) people is the voice of God, is it true that the 

192 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

majority of a group of boys or of youth is, in any useful 
sense in respect to their own government, authoritative? 

We may perhaps get some light upon these two ques- 
tions by considering a much larger question, with which 
indeed any treatment of class and pupil control is great- 
ly concerned, What are the qualities that we should 
desire to see manifested in our boys and girls? Are they 
just the same qualities as we require of adults? Would 
a society, indeed, be endurable by adults in which the 
boys and girls were on an even plane with their elders? 
Taken literally, are such phrases as "a manly boy," "a 
man with the heart of a child (or of a woman)/ 5 "a 
motherly girl," or "a boy with the sweet face of a girl" 
to be taken as satire or as praise? Is a thoroughly self- 
reliant boy one who promises well or not? Do not, in 
fact, sex and age modify the requirements? Such ques- 
tions are their own answers. Common sense, — which is 
a large part of ethics, — can permit no other answers. 

The best thing that we can say of a little boy or girl 
is to call it "an obedient child." We scarcely expect of 
it either cleanliness or neatness, tidiness or orderliness, 
not even truthfulness. Though we do expect of all 
older persons, — those from four years up, — decency and 
modesty in that sense, yet in the larger sense even 
modesty in men is seen to be a limitation upon their 
possible usefulness. We admire and praise fortitude 
and courage in men, yet in children the same qualities 
are seldom better than obstinacy and daring. We have 
indeed given bravery so wide a meaning that it is a 
virtue appropriate to human beings at any and every 
age; but upon consideration, how few the universal 
virtues are ! Honor, so greatly admired in men, is rep- 
rehended in boys; and loyalty requires too large an in- 

193 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

telligence to be possible to them. Truthfulness is an 
adult quality, previsioned only in part by the boy- virtue 
of truth-telling; but boys themselves often call the 
truth-speakers "tattle-tales," making nice distinctions 
of honor as to what may be told and what should be 
concealed. We applaud fearless men; but we watch 
fearless boys lest they come to grief. 
Among the "school virtues" 1 are these — viz.: 

1. Silence. 2. Punctuality. 3. Promptness. 4. Regu- 
larity. 5. Neatness. 6. Respectfulness. 7. Politeness. 
8. Orderliness. 9. Tidiness. 10. Cleanliness. 11. Truth- 
speaking. 12. Kindness. 13. Earnestness. 14. Diligence. 
15. Attentiveness. 16. Studiousness. 17. Frankness. 
18. Patience. 19. Niceness. 20. Sympathy. 

Of these, three things may be noted — viz.: 

First: We do not expect some of them in the con- 
duct of boys upon the playground or elsewhere out-of- 
doors, — e. g. } silence, neatness, tidiness, studiousness, 
patience, niceness, sympathy. 

Second: Some we do not expect of girls equally with 
boys, — e.g., regularity, orderliness, truth - speaking, 
studiousness, frankness. 

Third: Some we do not expect of boys equally with 
girls, — e. g., neatness, tidiness, kindness, patience, nice- 
ness, sympathy. 

Fourth: Of pupils under thirteen years of age, we ex- 
pect scarcely any qualities as much as of those above 
that age. 

Fifth : Some are not desired in full-grown men except 
under special conditions in certain occupations, — viz.: 
silence, respectfulness, studiousness, niceness. 

1 See pages 170-173, above, for a criticism of the term. 
194 



CONTROL OF THE CLASS AND INDIVIDUAL 

In short, we do not desire boys to be " little men" or 
men to be "big boys"; we do not desire girls to be 
"little women" or women to be "big girls." What we 
do hope and pray and work for are these things — viz.: 

First: That the child's qualities shall be the seeds of 
the man's qualities and of the woman's. Obedience to 
persons is to grow into self-reliance in the light of prin- 
ciples used intelligently via the mediate course of obedi- 
ence to fixed, certain, uniform and universal laws and 
customs. By this dialectic of growth, the child who 
obeys becomes the man who commands. 1 

Second: That since the motive of the school and of 
the college is self-culture, in the main but not wholly the 
personal qualities shall be developed in them, leaving 
the social and altruistic qualities to grow in the atmos- 
phere of church and of family and to come to full ma- 
turity in the adult's world of affairs. 

Third: That not to anticipate the conditions and re- 
quirements of the future, but rather to take the child's 
present conditions and requirements and himself, to 
make at once of these the most that we can is the true 
educational course, — " first the blade, then the ear, last 
the full corn in the ear." 

Fourth: That the true aim of school discipline is, upon 
consideration of the temperament and capabilities of 
each child, to develop him accordingly, not trying the 
miracles of converting one temperament into another, 
or of making the slow quick or the dull keen but using 
each pupil's capital rationally and completely. 

And yet for all persons of whatever age, sex or race, 

1 It was an old saying even in the time of Aristotle, — "For he who 
would learn to command well must, as men say, first of all learn to 
obey." — Politics, Book VII. 

' 14 195 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

virtue in itself consists in rejoicing and in sorrowing, in 
loving and in hating aright; and training in virtue 
teaches how to form judgments aright and how to 
produce delight in good dispositions and in noble actions. 
In this sense, education may develop virtue and fill 
out the deficiences of nature. 1 

"And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your 
faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowl- 
edge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to 
patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; 
and to brotherly kindness charity." 2 

"Always add: always proceed: neither stand still nor 
go back nor deviate. Be always displeased at what thou 
art. If thou sayest ' I have enough/ thou diest." 3 

1 Aristotle, On Politics, Books VII- VIII. 

2 Second Epistle of Peter i : 5, 6, 7. "Virtue" is steadfastness; 
" temperance," moderation. 

3 Saint Augustine, Sermon, Concerning the Words of the Apostles. 



"The surest way for the learner is not to advance by 
jumps and large strides; let that which he sets himself to 
learn next be indeed the next; that is, as nearly conjoined 
with what he knows already as is possible; let it be distinct 
but not remote from it; let it be new, and what he did not 
know before, that the understanding may advance; but let 
it be as little at once as may be, that its advances may be 
clear and sure. All the ground that it gets this way it will 
hold. This distinct, gradual growth in knowledge carries 
its own light with it in every step of its progression in an 
easy and orderly train." — Locke, Conduct of the Under- 
standing. 1685. 



CHAPTER VII 

CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING AND 
PROMOTING PUPILS 

What numbers properly constitute classes in the various schools 
and grades? — -The count-system in marking. — Four factors in grad- 
ing, — age, home opportunities, native powers, actual attainments. — 
Conspectus of elementary course of study. — Frequency of grading. — 
Retardation. — Machinery versus personality. — The "trick" of rela- 
tive standards versus the justice of absolute standards so far as these 
are humanly possible. — Why the class teachers generally should de- 
cide promotions, — and when they should not do so. — The precocious, 
the normal, the altricious. — Psychical ages versus physical. — The 
locus of a study.-— Overcrowded curriculums. — Study - periods at 
school. 

IN schools of more than one teacher, the classification 
of the pupils is never a matter wholly within the con- 
trol of any one teacher or school officer. In all schools 
with two or more teachers, the classification is a matter 
partly of the general organization as arranged by the 
higher school officers and partly of mutual arrangement 
among the several teachers. 1 A few principles, however 
respecting the matter are in place here. 

First: It is fairly agreed that, in elementary schools, 
the first primary grade and the eighth (or last) grammar 
grade should have classes smaller than those between. 

1 Chancellor, Our City Schools: Their Direction and Management, 
Chapter IV; also, Our Schools: Their Administration and Super- 
vision, Chapter VII. 

199 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

To illustrate: — Kindergarten, 25 pupils per teacher; first 
primary, 35 pupils; second to seventh, 40 pupils per teacher; 
and eighth grade, 35 pupils per teacher. It is a common 
enough saying that third grade is easiest to teach and fifth 
hardest to govern. But in respect to this matter, tempera- 
ment and training are important factors in the problem of 
adjusting teacher and grade. 

Second: It is universally agreed in the profession that 
teachers with two grades in a room, whether a half year 
or a year apart, should have less pupils than one all of 
whose pupils are in the same grade. Laymen on boards 
of education, however, usually give to the teacher with 
mixed grades more pupils than to the one-grade teacher. 
Since forty are as many as any teacher should ever 
have, a teacher with two grades should not have over 
thirty-two. A teacher with three grades should not 
have over twenty-four pupils. 1 

Third: It is commonly agreed that mixed classes (of 
both sexes) are easier to teach than girls' classes and 
that girls' classes are easier than boys' classes. It is 
commonly agreed that mixed schools are rather better 
than schools for separate sexes, even when in those 
schools there are separate classes for each sex. Some 
large cities have boys' and girls' high schools, but the 
tendency is not to establish such schools. In the same 
way, except in the largest cities, the tendency is to es- 
tablish high schools with complete curriculums and not 

1 The State of Maryland provides by law that a district school 
with over twenty-five pupils shall employ two teachers; with over 
fifty, three teachers, etc. This law, like the tenure of office and 
municipal pension laws of the State of New Jersey, the teachers' 
salary law of Indiana, and the separate school election laws of the 
Pacific Coast and Rocky Mountain States, should be inscribed in 
red letters in every teacher's book of memory. 

200 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

to make separate high schools for mechanic arts, for 
commerce, etc. 

Fourth: In classifying the pupils of small schools with 
two or three teachers, there is no fixed rule; but the 
tendency is to give to the lower (or lowest) teacher the 
larger (or largest) number of pupils, and likewise the 
smaller (or smallest) wages. In a three-teacher school, 
the intermediate teacher should usually be of the least 
experience, receive the least wages, and have the largest 
number of pupils; but the lowest teacher should have 
the middle amount of wages and the smallest number of 
pupils, while the highest teacher should have the great- 
est wages and the middle number of pupils. To this, 
there, of course, may be indubitable exceptions. 

Fifth: All proposed elementary classifications, such as 
placing foreigners in one school (or room) and natives 
in another (or room), or setting apart some pupils for 
preparation for high schools and others for instruction 
in trades, are contrary to sound Americanism. A wide 
variety of associates is good for every child, and there 
is but one standard educational regime — from motiva- 
tion, to intelligence, into efficiency and up to morality. 1 

The public school at any rate should be, must be, and 
I hope, always will be a universal school. The only 
concession to be made is to allow separate schools to 
negroes in the South or wherever they are numerous. 2 

Sixth: Classification in high schools and in grammar 
schools with departmental organization should, when- 

1 Chancellor, A Theory of Motives, Ideals and Values in Education, 
Chapters XI-XIII. 

2 For the argument to abandon the American common school (the 
German dream of the einheitschide realized), see Perry's Problems of 
the Elementary School, Chapters I— III. 

201 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

ever possible, be determined upon these factors and 
principles — viz. : 

I. Subjects requiring laboratory or library work 
should have smaller classes than such recitation-subjects 
as the Latin and Greek authors — e. g., a physics class 
should not have over twenty-four pupils, while a Caesar 
class may well have forty-two. Mediate between these 
extremes are classes in subjects requiring much written 
work to be examined by the teacher — e. g., English. 

II. Teachers whose work requires much outside prep- 
aration in advance or correction of papers after class 
should have both smaller classes and fewer recitations 
per day than other teachers. 

III. When a teacher has several classes of the same 
grade in the same subject, his assignment of number of 
recitations and of pupils per class may well be larger 
than that of teachers with several different subjects or 
the same subject in different grades. 1 

With the general classification determined, then, by 
considerations outside of the teacher's control, there 
remain three other allied matters partly within his or 
her control, and mainly to be operated by him. Of 
these, the first concerns the marking of pupils in respect 
to their conduct and to their proficiency in their studies. 
In cities, the class teachers mark in accordance with the 
directions of the higher authorities. Even so, however, 

1 One high school with 180 pupils had 14 teachers; another but 
forty miles away had 375 pupils with 12 teachers. But the former 
had poor ventilation and the latter excellent ventilation. In a gen- 
eral way, the teacher who commands the higher salary can and 
should do and usually wishes to do the harder work, — either more 
work with more pupils or more difficult work with more advanced 
pupils. The average salary paid in the former school, however, was 
actually higher than in the latter, showing a wiser community. 

202 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

the personal equation of the teacher enters into mark- 
ing. In villages, the kind of system used in marking is 
usually within the control of the teachers. 

Where class teachers do control this matter, or are 
influential in it, the following principles are likely to be 
accepted as reasonable and useful. Marking at all is, 
at least in part, "a necessary evil." Praise or censure 
of any individual by any other individual is a disagree- 
able matter. "Judge not" is a principle by no means 
alien from our better human nature. But teachers, 
however, are set as judges and dividers among children 
and youth; and from some marking, it is impossible to 
escape. 

1. It is desirable, therefore, to postpone marking as 
late in school life as public opinion will permit. To 
mark kindergarten or first or second grade children is 
scarcely ever required by the parental opinion or by 
the professional opinion of a community. In some 
places, pupils are not marked until the fifth grade. 

2. Both daily work and tests and examinations should 
be marked when any mark at all is given. Marking 
daily work, however, does not mean marking every day. 
It means crediting the pupils' daily lessons in the term 
mark. The usual custom is to count daily work half. 
It should not be counted less than that in any grade 
of elementary or high schools. Two - thirds is a 
fair proportion for intermediate grades ; and three - 
fourths for higher primary grades, when any mark is 
given. 

3. When any subject is marked, all others should be, 
lest the pupils neglect the subjects not considered by the 
teacher important enough to be marked. 

4. Averaging all subjects should not be required; 

203 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



but when required, the logical studies should be counted 
higher than the others. 

To illustrate: — 



Subjects Marks 


Counts 


Solution 


Grade VIII Arithmetic 7 


5 


7 x 5 = 35 


PUPIL'S NAME Grammar 5 


5 


5 x 5 = 25 


George J. Field Composition 6 


2 


6x2 = 12 


Physiology 9 


1 


9x1 = 9 


Writing 9 


1 


9x1 = 9 


Manual Work 6 


4 


6 x 4 = 24 


History 7 


3 


7x3 = 21 


Deportment Geography 9 


3 


9 x 3 = 27 


B Music 9 


1 


9x1 = 9 


Drawing 9 


2 


9x2 = 18 


Spelling 8 


2 


8x2 = 16 


Current Events 9 


1 


9x1 = 9 


12(93 


30 


30 |214 


7.9 




7.0 




General Average 






7.0 



In this instance, were all studies counted equally, the 
average would be not 7.0 but 7.9. 1 

5. The question of marking is part and parcel of the 
question of how often to send reports to parents. In 
cities with large foreign populations of ignorant parents, 
reports are often worse than useless, — often quite as 
much "bones of contention " as in some American- 
descended "old families." It is fairly agreed among 
educators that reports should be sent as infrequently as 
parental opinion will permit, certainly not more often 
than six times a year. 

1 The question of marking is discussed at length from the viewpoint 
of the Superintendent in Chancellor's Our City Schools: Their Direc- 
tion and Management, pp. 153-160. 

204 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

6. In setting down marks at the beginning of a year, 
it is wise to mark low, — to give the benefit of any doubt 
to the teacher. At the end of the grade or year, the 
benefit of the doubt belongs to the child. And children 
like to feel that they are going up-hill. 

The question of marking is not the same as those of 
grading, of promoting and of the report sent home, — 
common professional practice and parental opinion to 
the contrary notwithstanding. 

7. Whether to mark in words or in letters, in per 
cents, or on the scale of 10 or in figures (such as 1/ 2, 3, 
4) has long been a moot question. After trying various 
plans in several towns and cities, I have come to the 
practice of marking on the scale of 10 and now discour- 
age all my teachers from giving decimals except in the 
average. One advantage over words, over arbitrary 
figures and over letters is that decimals permit easy 
shifting of the " passing mark." An advantage over per 
cent, marks is that decimal marking does not attempt 
fine, impossibly fine, distinctions. Among the objections 
to " scale of 10 marking" is that "parents understand 
words better"; which I do not believe to be the fact. 
Another objection is that it tells the parents about their 
children too definitely. But why give them vague in- 
formation? Let us tell the facts, or say nothing at all. 
A third objection is that ignorant parents cannot inter- 
pret the scale figures. This is true. They err equally as 
to words and arbitrary letters; it is the first objection 
in another form. Such words as "satisfactory," "fair," 
and "excellent" give them much trouble. 

The grading of pupils should be with reference in 
part to each of four factors, — their ages, their home 
opportunities, their powers and their actual attainments. 

205 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



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L 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

This is a hard doctrine. It means that three several 
customary practices of our schools should be given up. 
It is unfortunately true that they are not likely soon to 
be given up everywhere; but until they are given up, 
we shall not have bona fide education. 

First: It is unfortunately true that in many cities 
there is insufficient housing accommodation for all the 
pupils. In such a condition, they drop out of school 
as soon as the law allows. Many do this, anyway; but 



4 5 6 7 6 9 10 11 i% £3 14 15 16 17 18 YEARS 



100 
90 
80 

70 i 

60 [ 

™ I 

40 I 

30 L 

20 |: 
10 

o_L 

school-congestion accelerates the process. In most 
States, the compulsory education term, fourteen years, is 
a precipice that may be accurately set forth in this dia- 
gram prepared from the records of over 2,000,000 pupils. 2 

1 But for the facts that in some States, the term is twelve years of 
age, and in others thirteen, and that the laws are not everywhere 
enforced, the precipice would be even higher. 

2 In this connection, it is highly important to note, first, that when 
the grades that enroll pupils above fourteen years of age have abun- 

207 




CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

In consequence of this disappearance, month by 
month, of pupils as they reach fourteen years of age, 
it is a common practice to pack the higher grades with 
pupils not prepared for their studies. One cause is that 
the school officers do not like to admit, either to them- 
selves or to the public, that so few pupils stay at school 
to finish even the grammar grades. Sometimes, I won- 
der how many pupils, upon an honest grading with a 
course of study intelligently prepared, would actually 
reach the grade next below high school, for I know that 
many are " pushed up/' Another cause is that room 
can be made in lower grades for new pupils by taking a 
series of groups, — now three, now ten pupils, — room by 
room, at almost any time in the year and "sending 
them on." This affects, often injuriously, the grading 
of nearly every class in the school. 1 

So classifying the pupils as to put really mixed classes 
into every room may be necessary, but then labelling 
them as uniform standard grades is objectionable on 
these several grounds. First, it worries the teachers. 
To be specific: The teacher who has thirty seventh- 
grade pupils and then is assigned ten more pupils who 
are really sixth grade in quality worries because she knows 
that she will be adjudged by the public, and fears that 

dance of "manual training," the number that fall over the precipice 
is much smaller than elsewhere; and, second, that school systems with 
ample kindergarten accommodations both have far less pupils 
retarded in grades 1 and 2 and lose less pupils at the precipice than 
school systems without ample kindergartens. When he had seen 
this hope of his young manhood as Superintendent of Schools of 
St. Louis realized on a great scale, Doctor W. T. Harris expressed 
the greatest happiness, for he had reached the vision of the true 
function of the kindergarten, — the awakening of self-activity. 

1 This is not to be taken as an objection to frequent regrading of 
classes, for the discussion of which see pages 199-202. 

208 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

she will be adjudged by the school authorities, a failure if 
the ten do not reach eighth grade along with the thirty. 
The second practice of our schools that must be 
abandoned in order that we may accept the principle 
that age, home opportunity, power and attainment 
should all be considered in grading is that of taking 
but one of these into account — -viz., attainments. To this 
practice, there are two objections, one of reason, the 
other of expediency. As a matter of reason, of the 
attainments of a pupil, — that is but one term for in- 
dicating his actual proficiency in the subjects of the 
course of study, and several others are equally good, — 
grading is seriously concerned with but one group — viz., 
his attainments in the logical studies. How far a pupil 
may have gone in history or geography, in music or 
drawing or manual training, is of but little concern: 
what he knows of number and arithmetic and of read- 
ing and grammar is, however, of vital importance. If 
attainments alone are to be considered in grading, then 
the field considered is still too large, for only English 
and mathematics really matter. A pupil may skip 
Asia and yet learn Europe in geography or the colonial 
period in American history and still learn the national 
period; but he cannot learn interest until he knows 
fractions or skip the parts of speech and yet learn the 
grammar of sentences. The order in the informational 
studies is a matter of convenience; that in the logical 
studies is one of necessity. 1 

1 When attainments and proficiency in other subjects must be 
considered, their rank in importance in determining the power to 
go forward is — highest, the logical studies; next lower, the psycho- 
logical exercises; still lower the physiological exercises; and lowest, 
the informational studies, whose key is "interest" and whose refrain 
is "tell us something new and delightful." 

209 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

The other objection to considering attainments alone 
in promotion is one of expediency in that in most in- 
stances one or another of the following situations is 
likely to develop — viz.: 

First: There is apt to be an excessive retardation of 
certain groups of children in the lower grades so that 
an absurd and even dangerous situation arises as to 
age. Children of twelve, thirteen, even fourteen years 
of age are allowed to hang fire in the lowest grades, even 
the first. In such grades, they are physically and 
morally and socially out of place, whatever be the facts 
in respect to their intellectual proficiency. This is so 
absurd that laymen on boards of education often pre- 
scribe, as a matter of common sense, a rule that upon 
the second endeavor to do the work of a grade the pupil 
shall be promoted, whether or not he has attained a 
satisfactory standard. The demoralizing effect of such 
a rule upon other and younger boys of an indolent 
temperament is obvious. The rule simply crystallizes 
the impression they get from the mere presence among 
them of those who cannot do the work. 

Second: There arise cases where pupils whose parents 
can and do help their children, in one or other of many 
ways, see them held back for want of technically satis- 
factory proficiency when the parents know that the 
actual understanding of the world and life of their chil- 
dren is sufficient to warrant advancement. Of course, 
to say that home opportunities should be considered in 
grading pupils raises at once the questions of "class- 
discrimination' 7 and "personal favoritism." But the 
answer is simple and sufficient. — Teachers do not create 
these differences, and our business is to operate with 

the facts. A slow or dull or careless boy whose parents 

210 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

can and will help him, or a frail girl not quite up to the 
mark but similarly helped at home may, and probably 
will, benefit by promotion where other children of the 
same qualities but without the same help would only 
suffer thereby. What we are to work for is the good of 
the child, not the maintenance of a mathematically 
ideal system. 

Third: The facts of varieties of powers not in exact 
correspondence with demonstrated attainments are too 
obvious to warrant delay on this point. To be specific : — 
A boy with "marks" of but 60 or 65 per cent, may 
nevertheless be in fact better fitted to advance into a 
higher grade than his companion whose marks average 
80 per cent. The qualities that indicate the wisdom of 
advancing a pupil without the required marks are ihese — 
viz.: 1. Eagerness to learn. 2. Persistence of en- 
deavor. 3. Wide general information. 4. Notable pro- 
ficiency in some lines, though there are deficiencies else- 
where, — in short, concentration, with materials on hand 
to be concentrated. 

The third practice of our schools that must be aban- 
doned in order to clear the way for a more rational and 
equitable procedure in respect to the grading of pupils 
is the substitution of machinery by personality in edu- 
cation. Machinery takes strange forms, some of them 
finer than spider's web. It is not merely a safe rule to 
use as little machinery as possible in education but one 
rather of the utmost importance as being essential to 
all true education, which is essentially such a relation of 
persons as results in the benefiting of inferior by the 
superior through the transmission of knowledge. In the 
actual practice of our schools, there is sometimes such 
a taking of refuge behind rules as may fairly be char- 

15 * u 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

acterized as the cowardice of the incompetent. In re- 
spect to the matter in hand, it is so much easier (for some 
natures) to say, — "But, Mrs. So-and-So, you see that 
your son's marks in arithmetic and geography are so 
much below the passing mark that it would be contrary 
to the rules to promote him/' than to enter upon a plain 
and comprehensible statement of the real facts about 
the boy that constitute the causes for his getting the 
low marks. Sometimes, in his heart (or hers), the 
teacher knows that, despite the marks, one boy who 
has passed should repeat and that another who is to 
repeat should be allowed to advance. The one boy 
may really be, either physically or mentally, too young 
to be ready for the higher work. This is espe- 
cially apt to be true in cities with schools of high 
standards. The other boy may be so old that he 
really requires the stimulus of the companionship of 
boys certainly not younger than those with whom 
he has, on technical marks, "failed to make the 
grade." 

Upon the ultimate analysis, we are really marking 
our pupils in most of the subjects by personal opinions 
rather than with machine-exactness. Even in mathe- 
matics, the opinions of teachers are often at variance. 
One teacher marks a problem as wrong when the answer 
is not correct. Another gives partial credit when the 
principles employed are correct but there is a slightly 
incorrect answer. A third ignores the answer and marks 
the problem right when the principles involved are 
understood, though the answer is seriously in error. A 
fourth goes through the problem and marks it in de- 
tail, — a right process and operation gets its full relative 

credit, though what goes before and after is all 

212 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

wrong. Given forty pupils, no two teachers could inde- 
pendently grade them all exactly the same. We are, 
therefore, back upon personal elements however we 
may seek to avoid them. 

Grading and promotions are related in theory as 
cause and effect, though for the reasons cited above, 
often despite failure to win promotion, a pupil is lifted 
forward, sometimes when neither he nor his parents, 
neither his teacher nor his schoolmates approve of the 
advancement. 

Various ideas to govern promotion are urged. Let 
us consider, first, the least meritorious. 

It is not at all uncommon to find that there prevails 
in a school system or in a neighborhood an " under- 
standing" that "good teachers never pass all of a class 
or 'keep back' many." When this vague understand- 
ing is reduced to definite terms, it means that every 
teacher must pass at least nine-tenths of the class but 
must not fail to "keep back" at least one pupil, other- 
wise, she either is "a poor teacher" whose children "fail 
to make progress" or a weak teacher without "a proper 
standard." 

This idea is on a par with that which, in respect to 
discipline, asserts, — "A good teacher always reports to 
the higher authorities a few pupils each year for mis- 
conduct but never reports many." 

The notion that, of any class, it may be said dog- 
matically that "some must fail" conveys plainly enough 
to those who understand such matters the fact that to 
those who hold it grading is a matter relative not to 
the subjects of the curriculum but to the "poorest 
scholar" in the class. Let us see, in a specific instance, 
how this works. 

213 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

' A — Five are excellent (say) 9 or over 
B — Twelve are good (say) 8 or over 
C — Fourteen are fair (say) 7 or over 
Class of forty pupils \ D_ Five are passable (say) 6 or over 
E — Two are poor (say) 4 or over 
F — One is very poor (say) 2 or over 
G — One is almost worthless (say) 

One teacher satisfies his " prof essional conscience" by 
holding back group G; another has a professional con- 
science demanding that groups G, F, E all must repeat. 
Perhaps there is now cited the rule of the system or 
of the neighborhood that "7 is the passing mark." 
What happens? These teachers discover a way to 
"mark up" all the delinquents except (say) groups G 
and F; or perhaps they "hold back" only G. On their 
theory and practice, they cannot "keep back" groups 
D, E, F, G, for they contain 9 pupils, nearly one-fourth 
of the class, whereas " nine- tenths must go forward and 
not over one-tenth (in this case 4 pupils) can properly 
be deprived of promotion." 

A second idea, which prevails in some regions, declares 
that the marks and opinions of the teachers should be 
either ignored or but slightly regarded and that "the 
higher school authorities should make the tests im- 
partially." In considerable travels and a fairly long 
experience of life, I have yet to see one human being 
judge another impartially. In such a situation, I pre- 
fer enthusiastically to be in favor of all those men and 
women who judge other human beings sympathetically. 
In consequence, it seems to me highly approvable to 
give the benefit of any reasonable doubt invariably to 
the student in all academic performances from kinder- 
garten to the college degree and therefore invariably to 

214 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

give the benefit of any reasonable doubt to the general 
public in respect to all professional certificates, licenses, 
and diplomas. In other words, where on a considerable 
scale human life and property, human culture and ethics 
are not at stake, let us favor the student; but where 
they are at stake, as in the cases of the physician's 
diploma, of the lawyer's certificate of admission to the 
bar, of the teacher's license, and of the minister's or- 
dination documents, let us favor those who otherwise 
might be the victims of dullards, of quacks, of the un- 
certain, and of the depraved. 

This second idea, — that it is best to let those who do 
not know the pupils determine their school-standings 
by rigid official tests, — has two proper uses. These are 
in the cases of " reasonable doubt" on the part of the 
teacher and in the cases of appeal by parents or 
guardians who feel that the teachers' opinions are in 
error. In all these cases, upon full hearings of all con- 
cerned, let the standings be determined by the high- 
er authorities when these are professional educators. 
Otherwise, the teacher himself should be the final 
judge. 

A third idea prevails in some sections, which is that all 
systems of promotion, of grading, and of marking should 
be made as flexible, — that is, as human, — as possible; 
and that all doubtful cases and all cases of "holding 
back" should be made " special orders" to be con- 
sidered by their teachers, by the next higher teachers, 
by the school authorities, and by the parents, in as close 
conference as is feasible, to the end that the best tiling 
shall be done for the child or youth. 

It is a bad thing for a boy or girl to be pushed 
forward beyond his mental powers or physical strength. 

215 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

It is a grave offence to keep a youth or child at work 
less difficult than he can do. 

It is a misfortune to be retarded at any stage in 
school; and it is also a misfortune to be graduated at a 
precocious age from the high school. 

Not a pair of Scylla and Charybdis but several pairs 
threaten the passage of a boy through the strait of 
school life. 

A flexible system of promotion involves different 
features in the several kinds of schools, — such as high 
and elementary schools; such as large city, union town, 
small city, graded rural, and district schools. No rules 
can be made to fit each case, other than the rule to try 
to be reasonable and sympathetic in all cases. Yet a 
few suggestions may be made. 

1. When possible, the school year should be divided 
at least once so that promotions may be made at least 
semiannually. In very large city schools, promotions 
can be made three and even four times a year. It is, 
however, nowhere desirable to assign a teacher less than 
a half year's work, — that is, to have more than two 
" grades' 7 to a year. There may be cases, indeed, where 
large schools should have their teachers stay two years 
with a class, covering four half-year " grades" with 
each set of pupils. This, of course, is a common prac- 
tice in small schools where the employing representatives 
of the people have the good judgment to keep good 
teachers year after year for many years, meeting 
offers of higher salaries to go elsewhere by raising 
the salaries after .success has been clearly demon- 
strated. 

2. Each grade teacher should be encouraged to learn 
by personal observation both the work of the grades 

216 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

above and below his or her own grade and also the pro- 
ficiency of the pupils in the next lower grade in order 
that he may be a competent adviser in these questions 
of grading and promotion in doubtful cases. We need 
to rid ourselves of the notion that any class-room or 
"school" x is any one's private domain whose possessor 
may exclude all others; and we need to get the notions 
that to have visitors and counsellors is a privilege 
and that to welcome them is both a duty and an 
honor. With right-minded teachers and with nearly 
all pupils, these occasional inquiries with brief visitings 
tend to create incidentally a highly desirable school 
spirit. The publicity of the school began with the 
English Channel and Magna Carta. 

3. Whatever be the size of the school, from each class 
there should be both promotions and demotions at al- 
most any time 2 when the teachers concerned think that 
the changes would benefit the pupils. No doubt, de- 
motions should be rare, for they usually indicate errors 
in promotion; but when rationally justified, upon con- 
sultation with the parents, they should be enforced. 
This is not to advocate meddling regradings at any and 
all times, but it is to advocate constant attention to 
the proficiency of the pupils. Obviously, such pro- 
motions and rare demotions as are here proposed 
will occur more frequently in the lower primary grades 

1 For an explanation as to the historical cause whence arose in the 
South generally and in several other regions the calling of each class 
a " school" and the absence of any name for the collection of 
classes, which in the North generally is called the school, see Our 
City Schools: Their Direction and Management, pages 37-42. 

2 There should be no promotions or demotions toward the end of 
a term ; nor when additions of pupils to another room would seriously 
incommode the teacher there. 

217 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

than elsewhere. By the time a boy or a girl has 
reached sixth grade, his psychical rate, power, reten- 
tiveness, persistence, and other qualities will have been 
fairly measured. In all probability, he is where he be- 
longs. 

Even so, however, in any grade during the adolescent 
period, there may be cases of sudden changes in powers 
that require adjustment to easier or harder school- 
duties. Sometimes, it is possible to arrange within the 
same grade to give the child or youth either more work 
of the same character or slightly harder work without 
promoting him, when such a course of action seems to 
be desirable, or less work or slightly easier, under the 
opposite circumstances, rather than demoting him. Pro- 
motions tend to elate the pupils; sometimes, when the 
encouragement is undue or when the pupil is by tem- 
perament and disposition overambitious or not well- 
poised, their ultimate effect upon health or character is 
unfortunate. Demotions tend to depress the pupils; 
they should never take place save under such circum- 
stances as the following — viz.: 1. When the pupil is 
lazy, deficient, and indifferent and his sufferance in the 
class has the bad influence of seeming to indicate on the 
part of the teacher a low standard of requirement. 
2. When the health of the pupil suffers from overstrain 
at tasks beyond his powers. 

In respect to all these matters of classifying, grading, 
and promoting, two other general considerations are 
pertinent, — relative ages of pupils and the organization 
of the course of study. 

It is a matter of common observation that age is not 
to be told wholly by count of years. Some boys are 
older at ten years of age than others are at fourteen. 

218 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

Age is a matter of sex, — girls of the same race, tempera- 
ment and health are always older year for year of life 
than boys of the same race, temperament and health. 
Age is also a matter of race. Year for year, boys of the 
same temperament and health are always older among 
the Slavic peoples than among the Latin, and older 
among the Latin peoples than among the Celtic, and 
again older among the Celtic peoples than among the 
Teutonic. Year for year, boys of the same race and 
health are always older when of the speculative, re- 
flective, anxious temperament than when of the motor 
temperaments. The ideo-motor are older in mind than 
the muscular motor; and these than the vital corpulent, 
who are youngest of all. As for health, there is no gen- 
eral rule. Some forms of ill-health tend to keep the 
mind undeveloped and childish, other forms tend to 
induce undue maturity. 

In respect to age, we may classify our pupils relatively 
as follows — viz.: 

1. The precocious. 

2. The normal. 

3. The altricious. 

By race, relatively , in respect to age our pupils may 
be classed in these j roups — viz. : 

1. Latins and Slavs. 

2. Celts. 

3. Teutons (including nearly all the English in America). 

The correspondences in respect to ages are as follows — 

viz.: 

219 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Slavs 4 years = Latins 5 years=Celts 6 years=Teutons 7 years 
Slavs 11 years=Latins 12 years=Celts 13 years=Teutons 14 years 
Slavs 18 years = Latins 20 years = Celts 22 years = Teutons 25 years 

In giving these figures, I speak from personal informa- 
tion from experiences such as these — viz.: 

1. Direction of evening schools with adult foreigners as 
well as " Americans' ; from over fifty different " national- 
ities." In our Eastern cities, we have learned that neither 
term conveys much information. To illustrate: In one 
primary class under my supervision, twenty-three different 
" nationalities" were represented. 

2. Investigation of the cases of many thousands of "Afro- 
Americans," from which I have learned that it is useless to 
try to estimate the American " negro." He may be half- 
Portuguese (Latin); or sixty -three sixty-fourths Anglo- 
Saxon. He is the most inclusive mestizo the world has ever 
known; in about one case in sixteen, he is a pure-blooded 
negro. Even so, he may come from any one of a dozen 
different races and tribes. Most negroes and mulattoes are 
precocious. Ladinos with much Indian blood are altricious. 
Quadroons and octoroons are normal, though quicker to de- 
velop than Americans of English descent. 

By temperament, in respect to age, pupils may be 

classified as follows — viz.: 

1. The reflective (with triangular faces) : precocious. 

2. The nervous motor (with rectangular faces) > , 

3. The muscular motor (with square faces) ) 

4. The vital corpulent (with round faces) : altricious. 

The correspondences are as follows — viz.: 

220 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADI NG, PROMOTING 

Reflective 4 years old = nervous motor 5 years = muscular motor 

6 years = vital corpulent 7 years. 
Reflective 11 years old = nervous motor 12 years = muscular motor 

13 years = vital corpulent 14 years. 
Reflective 18 years old — nervous motor 20 years = muscular motor 

22 years == vital corpulent 25 years. 

This is not a matter known only to the educational 
or psychological student; all observers of human nature 
are familiar with it. Every class-room in America, every 
assemblage of persons, all experiences of those who have 
lived long enough to see the life-histories of themselves 
and of others confirm the opinion that equality of years 
does not mean equality of mental age, or of physical, 
either. 

By sex, in respect to age, we differ as follows — viz.: 

Women 4 years old = men 5 years 
Women 12 years old = men 14 years 
Women 18 years old = men 22 years 
Women 45 years old = men 56 years 

In the light of such obvious or easily demonstrable 
facts as these, it is clear why it is necessary to call atten- 
tion to the danger of purely arbitrary grading of pupils 
by age, as e. g., saying that " pupils should enter high 
school at fourteen years of age" or that "a young man 
should be through college before he is twenty-three." 
But — "it all depends" ! There are indeed several other, 
though minor factors — e. g., the economic condition of 
the student, his cultural environment, climate, and local 
social tradition. 

Assuming that the entire course of a professional edu- 
cation is in view, one may set down the range of ages 
in the various years of the course as follows — viz.: 

221 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



School 



Length of Course Grade Ages of Pupils 



Kindergarten 



Elementary 



College 



Professional 



Two years * 




4-6 years 




r I 2 


6-8 




II 


7 -10 




ill 3 


8 -11| 


Eight years 


IV 
V 4 


9 -13 
9* -14* 




VI 5 


10 -15 




VII 


11 -15* 




I VIII 


12 -16 




' 1st 6 


13 -16* 


Four years 


2d 
3d 


14 -17 

15 -17* 




> 4th 


15|-18 




' 1st 


16 -20 


Four years 


2d 
3d 


17 -21"* 

18 -23 




. 4th 7 


19 -25 




' 1st 


20 -26 


Three years < 


2d 


21 -28 




3d 


22 -30 



1 For nearly all children, one year is a long enough stay in the 
kindergarten; but children should never start primary work before 
she is five years and six months old or he is six years old. 

2 A study of the statistics of two million pupils shows that in those 
systems where every child has a kindergarten training, the laggards 
in First Grade are relatively very few. Where the system has no 
or but few kindergartens, this upper age limit should be raised to 
nine years. 

3 Already the dullards have begun to appear. They may later 
become the best of intellects, but they affect the upper age limit 
significantly by this grade. 

4 At this point, the naturally precocious begin to manifest them- 
selves in considerable numbers by skipping year grades or half-year 
grades and then "doing the best work though the youngest in the 
class," as the teachers tell the fond and pleased parents. It is not 
always a dangerous sign — in girls. The precocious, unless of ex- 
ceptional strength, size and health, should be somewhat repressed, 
though of course not suppressed. Otherwise, the school helps the 
mind to exhaust the body. 

5 At this point, the really dull and the retarded drop out, lowering 
the upper age limit. Here the muscular motor can be saved for 

222 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

Not less important and even more difficult of exposi- 
tion is that other neglected factor, the organization of 
the course of study. For all the work that has been 
done by serious educators in hundreds of towns and of 
cities for half a century, our public schools have yet not 
solved the two great problems of the curriculum, which 
are, first, at what ages our youth should study each 
subject, and, second, how many subjects should they 
take at one stage — that is, in one grade. Technically, 
the first problem is — What is the locus of each study and 
exercise? We must solve this before we can solve the 
second problem. Each of these problems is out of 
the control of the class teacher in any system of 
schools. Even rural teachers in the simple district 
school cannot do as they choose in teaching sub- 
jects. 

The problem may be illustrated by examples, of which 
I choose three — viz.: American history and handwriting 
in the elementary school, and geometry in the high 
school — i. e. } an informational study, a psychological 
drill-exercise, and a logical study. 

schooling only by handcrafts taught faithfully. From this point on, 
our schools, keeping as they do the nervous motor and the reflective 
and losing the vital corpulent and the muscular motor, no longer 
reflect the average condition of the American people in respect to 
temperament. Also by this time, the prematurity (racial precocity) 
of the Slavic and Latin stocks has drawn most of them into the 
working world. 

6 High schools should now have only five-year and six-year courses. 
Their work is typically overcrowded and too compacted. 

7 In college and professional school, we have many students who 
have gone forward discontinuously. It would be a good thing for 
girls if they were required to stay out of school one full year in every 
quadrennial period of their education. Such is my own course with 
several daughters, 

223 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

GRADES 



5 years 
x 





X 

i 

2 years 

X 


VIII 


SUBJECT 


VII 
VI 


AMERICAN HISTORY 


V 


IV 






III 
II 




I 



We may do, in reason, some twelve different things 
with this situation. Here are four of the twelve — viz.: 

1. We may teach American history for five years, in 
Grades IV to VIII, inclusive. This is not seldom done. 

2. We may teach it for three years, in Grades VI-VIII. 

3. We may teach it in Grade IV and review it again in 
Grade VII — a two years' discontinuous treatment. 

4. We may teach it only in Grades V-VI. 

I. The lower the locus of the study, the easier we must 
try to make its content. 

II. The longer its locus, the more complete may be 
its treatment. 

III. A false locus betrays the true philosophy of any 
subject. 

My opinion is that the true locus of American history is 

(a) in Grades VII- VIII, with pupils of the ages 
assigned above (page 222) ; 

(6) daily for a forty-minute period. 

This, of course, is above the compulsory age-limit of 
most States; but that age-limit should be sixteen years 

224 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 



of age, with a dollar a week per child from the public 
funds to help widows bring up fatherless boys and girls. 



8 years 



GRADES 





X 

i 

3 years 

X 


VIII 




VII 


SUBJECT 


VI 
V 


HANDWRITING 


IV 




III 
II 




I 



Here again we may do many different things. I ven- 
ture again an opinion as follows — viz.: 

(a) The formation of letters should be taught in 
Grades I and II, daily, for a twenty-minute period. 

(6) Systematic daily drill in handwriting as an art 
should begin in Grade IV and continue through Grades 
V and VI. 

(c) The boy or girl who has not then learned to write 
well should be forgotten until puberty is well estab- 
lished, when cross-heredity may give better nervous and 
muscular control; and 

(d) The subject may be taken up as it were de novo 
in the first and second years of the high-school course. 

In the early adolescent period, good handwriting is 
often broken up forever; but I do not recall a case where 
a boy at thirteen years of age or a girl at twelve years 
who could not write well learned how to do so in the next 
two years. The drill-period for most boys is from nine 

225 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



to thirteen; for most girls, from eight to eleven years 
of age. 

In other words, we now spread handwriting too gen- 
erally and too thinly through the course. As a special 
exercise, it should be concentrated in three years. 
Though I do not deal specifically with arithmetic or 
geography in this treatment, I entertain similar opinions 
regarding their pursuit. 

The locus of geometry has been shifted up and down 
the scale of the grades, up and down from top to bottom, 
several times since Euclid discovered its nature and first 
propositions. In one form, Froebel placed it in the 
kindergarten, though not a kindergarten for children 
under six years old. 

GRADES 

College 



High School 



SUBJECT 



x 

i 

1 year 
X 



GEOMETRY 





1st 




4th 




3d 




2d 


X 


1st 
VIII 


1 

5 years 

I 


VII 
VI 


X 


V 
IV 

III 




II 




I 




Kdgn. 



Elementary 
School 



226 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

At present, many of "the progressives" propose to 
place some geometry in the kindergarten, some in Grade 
VI or VII, more in the second year of the high school, 
and the rest in college. The present " conservatives" 
would force it all into the second high-school year. 
Some educators for decades have been placing it in the 
first year of the high school before algebra. 1 

The question of what is the true locus of any school 
subject is a matter of fact, to be determined by psycho- 
logical experiment and pedagogical verification. My 
own opinion is that for educational uses we have dif- 
ferentiated arithmetic, algebra and geometry too sharp- 
ly and have integrated them too completely and that 
what we now actually need is elementary mathematics 
for our grammar grades and first and second high-school 
years. But wanting in current practice such a logical 
order as will put the topics of arithmetic, algebra and 
geometry in their true rational relations, I incline to 
the view that arithmetic now has too low a locus and too 
long a range in our elementary schools and that what 
we know as geometry should occupy one and a half years 
in the second and third years of our high schools. 2 

The second of the great unsolved problems of the or- 
ganization of the curriculum is how many subjects should 
be assigned to each grade. This is a special problem in 

1 In 1878, in the public schools of the city of Dayton, under John 
Hancock, a famous educator of that period, as superintendent, I 
studied and finished algebra in the Seventh Grade and studied 
geometry in the Eighth Grade. None of the pupils of my class had 
any serious difficulties with either subject. The average age of the 
pupils of that class was eleven years in the Seventh Grade. I cite 
this merely to indicate that it is unsafe to say of such pedagogical 
propositions, "It cannot be done." 

2 For a course of study, see Appendix IV. 
16 227 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

application of the Aristotelian principle of the "golden 
mean." On the one side, we have the child who is to 
make his growth and to live his own life as an individual. 
On the other side, we have a great and a complicated 
society ever growing greater and more complicated. It is 
dangerous for one to go into that society poorly equipped 
in knowledge and in training. It is perilous for society 
to receive one more individual poorly equipped. It 
is pretty well agreed now that the school curriculum is 
overcrowded already. It is likewise agreed that our 
school "graduates" commonly know rather less than 
they should know before entering upon their life-work. 
The first consideration requires change by omissions in 
the course of study: the second requires change by ad- 
ditions. The situation is worse than a dilemma: it is 
a battle between opposing forces. 

It may help somewhat to say that perhaps age as a 
factor may be important. Perhaps we should favor the 
child in the early stages of education and society in the 
later. Perhaps a better professional knowledge of the 
temperaments of children and more skill in teaching 
may help somewhat. Perhaps we squander time in 
teaching the motor boys to be efficient — they are 
efficient naturally; the vital to be good and kind — they 
are both by birth; the reflective to be careful — which 
they cannot help being. Certainly some of us squander 
time in teaching badly subjects of which we know too 
little and exercises in whose technique we are seriousty 
deficient. But even so, we have not done enough to 
clear up this difficulty and to bring the individual 
himself and the social requirements as expressed in 
the course of study into a harmony that properly 
unites both. Frankly, the problem is beyond not 

228 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

only class teachers, but at present our educationalists 
also. 

A few suggestions may, however, help practical class 
teachers in a measure. 

I. The apportionment of material from the several 
subjects of an elementary or secondary school course is 
seldom just in all details. When it is unfair as between 
the grades, the class teachers may persuade the higher 
authorities to readjust the apportionments. To be 
specific: I. Generally throughout the land, too much 
work is assigned to Grade I, especially in number (arith- 
metic). There are many, very many, " Advanced First 
Grades" that really should be called " Grade II." The 
test is simple and final. Given two periods of twenty 
minutes a day, how much work in numbers can a class 
of thirty-five pupils aged six to eight reasonably do in 
one year? This means that all except the feeble- 
minded and the lazy are to pass, — all of them. My own 
opinion is — Maximum, the number 12, preferably 10; 
and counting to 100. — All the work to be dramatized. 
Minimum, — which I consider entirely reasonable, — 
counting to 12, no dissection of any numbers at all. 

II. Generally, in order to prolong the subjects of the 
elementary course through all the grades there is a deal of 
what, closely considered, is scarcely else than " marking 
time" in them because the pupils for want of intellectual 
development are incapable of rapid progress. Intellect- 
ual development is itself a tricksome phrase; but it has 
meaning enough when closely considered — it is that 
thing which in properly constituted individuals is the 
result of normal physical and psychical growth in com- 
bination with suitable educational advantages. By no 
means all the progress in intellectual power to be ob- 

229 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

served in the normal child between his condition at 
entrance to kindergarten and his condition at graduation 
from grammar school is due to the school, for some of 
it, despite the naive assumptions of his teachers, has 
been due to natural growth. 

2. When the directions of the higher authorities are 
not so detailed as to make the two following suggestions 
impracticable without violation of such directions, we 
may ease the daily work in a measure, first, by omitting 
some subjects for a term and emphasizing other and then 
emphasizing the omitted subjects and dropping others 
for a time, and, second, by having somewhat different 
programs for (say) Mondays and Thursdays from those 
for Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays. 1 

To illustrate : — The course of study may call for so much 
history and so much geography each year; but it may per- 
haps be permissible to take the history for one half of the 
year and the geography for the other half. 

Again: — The course may call for drawing and manual 
training each term; but in such case it may be permissible 
to give the drawing three days a week and the manual train- 
ing for two days. Such are two possible applications of the 
principle. 

3. The class, even though properly graded, may be 
divided into three or four groups for recitation, study, 
construction lessons and other purposes. In some cities, 
in lower grades it is the universal practice; and not in- 
frequent in the higher grades. Whether it is desirable 
or not depends much upon the temperament and tech- 
nical training of the teacher. That it promotes the wel- 
fare of peculiar children is certain. 

1 See pages 123, 140, 141, above, 
230 



CLASSIFYING, MARKING, GRADING, PROMOTING 

4. In almost any class, there are some children who 
are unusually proficient in some subjects and yet al- 
most correspondingly deficient in others. Unless the 
higher authorities have been unduly detailed in their 
prescriptions, the class teacher may so vary the pro- 
grams of individual students as to permit them to put 
their strength where it is needed. To be specific : A girl 
in Grade III actually reads well enough to be in 
Grade VI, but is poor in arithmetic. Let her take four 
of the five reading periods a week for extra study upon 
arithmetic. Or a boy in Grade V is good in arithmetic, 
but poor in spelling: let him omit two or three lessons 
a week in arithmetic for a time in order to give extra 
study to spelling. 

In general, for the entire situation, I heartily indorse 
the practice of giving to every pupil in school at the 
least one-third of his time daily to study and to the 
preparation of lessons and to every teacher one-fifth of 
his or her time solely to the supervision of the pupils 
in individual study. To put the matter otherwise: In- 
stead of trying to give to the pupils as many hours of 
recitation and of exercises daily as possible, try rather 
to give them at least one-third and preferably one-half 
of the time daily to study. Where classes are divided 
into several groups, this is easy of accomplishment. 

Even if we must overcrowd the curriculum for the 
school considered as a whole, let us not overcrowd 
the individual pupil. How to organize our school 
courses so as to avoid the former offence to a 
sound applied psychology, may be a problem for philo- 
sophical educators; but the latter problem is the busi- 
ness of every practical class teacher. Short hours and 
high pressure is the new educational order; but it must 

231 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

not mean defrauding the pupil either of his right to pre- 
pare his lessons at school and to review them at school, 
or of his right to pursue at each stage in his education 
a few and not a multitude of studies and exercises. 

Intellectual confusion is too high a price to pay for 
enlightenment from too many directions at once. 



" We should therefore see if it be possible to place the art 
of intellectual discipline on such a firm basis that sure and 
certain progress may be made. Since this basis can be 
properly laid only by assimilating the processes of art as 
much as possible to those of Nature, we will follow the 
method of Nature, taking as our example a bird hatching 
out its young; and if we see with what good results gar- 
deners, artists, and builders follow in the track of Nature, 
we shall have to recognize that the educator of youth should 
follow in the same track. 

"Nature observes a suitable time. 

" Nature is not confused in its operations, but in its for- 
ward progress advances distinctly from one point to 
another. 

"In all the operations of Nature, development is from 
within." — Comenius, The Great Didactic. 1649. 



CHAPTER VIII . 

HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND A GOOD CLASS 

The school as seen by a visitor. — Active attention, absorbed atten- 
tion, deliberative attention. — Order and decorum of the pupils. — The 
use of the English language. — Voice. — Condition of the room itself. 
— School equipment. — Qualifications as seen by systematic ob- 
servers. — Aims of the good class teacher. — The school spirit. — In- 
terest of each pupil in his own welfare: self-activity. — The school 
neighborhood. — The financial authorities. — Public opinion. 

IN order to have a good class, three things are always 
requisite, — an ideal, an intention to realize it, and 
skill. It may help to form the ideal for us to consider 
how others judge classes. 

There are several degrees in which one may discrimi- 
nate regarding teachers. The first is by looking in upon 
their classes. The second is by periodical visits to the 
classes, staying long enough to see the work in process. 
The third is to observe systematically for a considerable 
length of time the later history of the pupils. 

It is a safe opinion to venture that in nine cases out 
of ten a skilful supervisor's impression of a class will 
be borne out substantially unchanged, — save as the 
class changes, — by a series of visits fortnightly or often 
for a year, and that his greatest disappointment will be 
in case it does not change for the better, and that upon 
his first visit, from the relation then discovered between 
the teacher and the class, he will be able to predict the 

235 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

future record of that class. The excellence of skill in- 
deed is, given unchanged factors, in the certainty of its 
prediction. Conversely once in ten cases, the single 
observation will prove erroneous. It may have been 
too favorable or too unfavorable. Hence in about nine- 
teen cases out of twenty, the single observation is as 
favorable as was fitting. Once in twenty cases, it was 
not favorable enough. Unskilful supervisors and lay- 
men make many errors upon single observations, though 
seldom against the teacher. In other words, when a 
layman or an unskilful supervisor reports, after one brief 
visit, that a teacher is incompetent, he is seldom wrong: 
but when he reports favorably, he is much more likely 
to be wrong. 

It is also a safe enough opinion that a skilful super- 
visor's annual report regarding the work of a teacher in 
a class that he has visited (say) fortnightly for a year, 
staying in all at least ten hours in the room, would not 
be challenged once in a hundred cases by any committee 
of supervisors making a drastic examination of the 
teacher's work because of that report. Less than once 
in a hundred cases, he will report erroneously; but he is 
just as likely to be too favorable as too unfavorable, so 
that scarcely once in two hundred cases is a skilful super- 
visor's annual report on a teacher too unfavorable and 
therefore unfair. 

Teachers also in their views of supervisors are just as 
likely to be lenient as to be censorious. 

And it is a safe enough opinion that after a teacher 
has taught in the same neighborhood five years, the pro- 
fessional opinion entertained of that teacher will be the 
same in nearly every case as the opinion of the great 
majority of the parents and citizens. I am speaking 

236 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

now solely of class teachers, not of supervisory officers. 
I have had over three thousand different teachers under 
my official observation; I have investigated the records 
of several times as many more; and I do not recall ten 
instances where the professional opinion regarding an 
experienced teacher differed materially from that of a 
majority of the lay-observers of that teacher. As super- 
intendent in four different cities, I have known but two 
cases where the general opinion of the citizens regarding 
the experienced class teachers was materially different 
from that of the supervisory officers. In both these 
cases, professional opinion proved upon later develop- 
ments to be right, and public opinion wrong; and in 
both cases, the public were too lenient, mistaking in one 
instance physical force for moral power and in the other 
pretentious affability for constant scholarship. Leniency 
to teacher or to supervisor is, of course, a wrong to the 
pupils. And censoriousness is a wrong to the edu- 
cator. 

It appears that since the critics are usually right, per- 
haps the criticized may benefit by learning beforehand 
by what criterions the professional and lay-critics judge. 

Taking first the half-hour visit, let us note seriatim 
what the skilful observer seeks to discover. 

1. Upon entrance to the room, one notices the air of 
the pupils and of the teacher. This "air" is a matter, 
in the main, of the attention that is being paid by both 
pupils and teacher to the work. There are three kinds 
of attention. The first is active attention, — listening, 
seeing, touching. In part, it represents usually the 
activity of the "special senses/ 7 — seeing, hearing, touch- 
ing, smelling, tasting. But it represents also the direct 
activity of the mind aroused by and considering the 

237 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

things brought before it by these senses. 1 The second 
is absorbed attention, commonly known as concentration, 
and usually in evidence when one is interested in the 
work at hand. In such a case, no attention is being 
paid to what is going on around the worker, who is "lost" 
in his task. The third kind is deliberative attention, when 
one is thinking upon something in consciousness. 

A visitor should expect to discover from their coun- 
tenances, attitudes, and manners active attention on the 
part of the students, should the teacher be giving instruc- 
tion or conducting a recitation; absorbed attention, should 
they be engaged in lesson-study or upon the perform- 
ance of some assigned exercise; and deliberative atten- 
tion, should their duty be to think something over. 

The opposite of these modes of attention are (1) no 
attention at all, but sheer passivity; (2) dissipated at- 
tention, with eyes for everything and yet for nothing; 
and (3) misdirected attention, more commonly known 
as "mischievousness." 

2. The visitor notices the general order of the room 
and the decorum of individual pupils. Order does not 
necessarily mean stillness; but it does mean something 
less than noisiness. It means progress from one 
item of the matter under consideration to another; 
it is the opposite of confusion. It may not mean 
silence; but it does not mean whispering, 2 note- 

1 This, of course, is not to be taken as asserting the limitation of 
the senses to five in number. For the locations and nature of our 
40,000 "special" senses, see Titchener's Outlines of Psychology, page 
67. For the educational significance of sense-life, see A Theory of 
Motives, Ideals and Values in Education, Chapter XI, "Intelligence." 

2 Whispering is a technical school offence, — it is speaking to an- 
other pupil without general or specific permission. How much 
communication between pupils, a teacher should permit depends 

238 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

writing, and an undertone of voices, with strange 
signalings and eye- winkings. It does not necessarily 
mean all the pupils doing uniformly the same things at 
the same time; but it certainly does mean that each 
pupil is doing with appropriate quietness the thing that 
his teacher wishes done. It means that reason is in 
control. In an elementary or secondary school, order 
means obedience to the rules as expressed and enforced 
ultimately by the teachers. 

3. The blackboard will be noticed. Good teachers 
have blackboard work appropriate to their grades. 
Their own blackboard instruction is legibly and neatly 
written; their handwriting is neither a scrawl nor a 
flourishing scroll, but a fair model. Much of the work 
on the blackboard will be that of the pupils; and while 
no reasonable visitor will expect perfection, he will ex- 
pect to see evidences that the teacher tries to secure 
careful writing from the pupils. The notion that unless 
all pupils do excellent work the teacher is incompetent, 
springs from the false assumption that the order of a 
teacher is the equivalent to performance by the pupils: 
it is in short the denial that education is a process re- 
quiring time, going forward by stages, issuing from in- 
ternal endeavor, and only eventuating at the end in the 
faithful and congenitally normal pupils in the degree of 
perfection desired. 

It is perhaps expedient to note here that the black- 
board is rather for exercising the powers of the pupils 
than for displaying the accomplishments of the teacher 
in writing and in drawing. It follows that while in 

upon many considerations. But in general, let us remember that 
inhibition is a large part of education because it is a condition co- 
incident with concentration. 

239 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

lower grades some blackboard illustrations by the teach- 
er are desirable, even in such grades most of the space 
should be used daily by the pupils. 

4. The visitor will probably notice the orderliness of 
the teacher's own desk, and the neatness and appro- 
priateness of his or her mode of dress. Mere newness or 
richness of attire is not the desideratum, but on the 
contrary may be objectionable as attracting undue at- 
tention. Simplicity, durability, ease of fit, a texture 
that throws off dust or else washableness of the fabric, 
and dignity or harmony of cut and of color are the 
desiderata. 

5. The cleanness of the room is likely to come under 
the eye of the visitor. Of course, in graded schools 
there are janitors, and often janitors are appointed from 
politics; 1 nor are they appointed by the teacher. But a 
good teacher usually finds a way to persuade or to com- 
pel the janitor to keep his or her room clean, — usually, not 
always, for in the conditions prevailing in some American 
communities, the janitors are sometimes both indifferent 
to their real business, which is to keep the school-house 
clean, and too sure of their positions to care what the 
teachers think and say of their services. In some dis- 
trict schools, the teachers are also janitors; in which 
case, they should keep their schools clean as a duty 
quite as important as teaching well. 

On the other hand, there are teachers whose rooms 
are always littered with papers or pieces of chalk; where 
rags for wiping pens and for cleaning the brushes used 

1 This word has come to include every quality other than a sincere 
desire and a proper method to secure the best person for a position, 
the best plan for an enterprise, the best means for the end rationally 
and morally proposed. 

240 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

in color- work are hung on the school desk-irons; where 
books are lying " every which way" in the book-closet; 
where the pupils' caps and coats, hats and cloaks are 
anywhere but in the wardrobe ; and where the vis- 
itors' chairs are broken; and yet where the jan- 
itors are excellent men, constantly protesting to 
these very teachers to take more pains in these mat- 
ters. 

6. The visitor is likely to note many other items, — 
such as the even or uneven drawing of the shades, the 
mode of greeting as he enters, the mode of enduring his 
presence, and the mode of greeting at his exit. These 
items are relatively perhaps not important; but they 
affect his general opinion. A well-controlled class is 
not likely to pay much attention to the advent, pres- 
ence, or departure of a visitor; and a socially experienced 
teacher will be friendly yet not only at ease but also not 
unduly concerned at the visit. A public school is indeed 
public; even our private schools in America are usually 
open to visitors. It is now the better approved course 
not to train the pupils to give a general greeting to 
casual visitors, but to expect them to proceed quietly 
with their tasks. 

7. In staying a half-hour, the visitor is likely to note 
many of the following features of the educational proc- 
ess in that room — viz.: 

I. The style of conducting the recitation, (a) Whether 
the instruction, whatever be the method, holds all or 
nearly all the pupils greatly interested. (6) Whether 
the lesson makes steady headway to the appointed 
goal, (c) Whether the teacher is disconcerted either 
by the ignorance or mistakes of some of the pupils or 
by misconduct. 

241 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



GENERAL PRINCIPLES APPLICABLE IN ALL LESSONS 

1. Call upon each pupil in each lesson at least once. 

2. Give one who fails, if possible, a second question. 

3. Help the one who is likely to fail ; but do not tell the 
answer until his curiosity is thoroughly aroused. 

4. Except in reviews, ask questions promiscuously. 

5. In reviews, it is permissible to go around the class by 
rows and files or alphabetically or in any other order. 

6. Ask the inattentive pupil an unexpected question. 

7. Usually ask the question before naming the pupil who 
is to answer it. 

8. Require nearly all answers in complete sentences. 

9. Avoid asking questions of those who know the answers. 

10. Ask questions of such a nature as to induce the pupils 
thereafter more and more diligently to study their lessons. 

11. Often get various answers and compare them. 

12. In some subjects, at times, let some pupils do black- 
board-writing while others write at their desks and still 
others recite. 

13. Try to develop pupils at their weak places, but do not 
persist in this to the point of discouraging any. 

14. Do not allow the questions of the pupils to hinder or 
to sidetrack the progress of the lesson: answer such ques- 
tions at another time. 

15. Use new material, not in the books, and original il- 
lustrations. 

16. Require erect positions and distinct speech. 

17. Develop the originalities of each pupil. 

18. Talk to the pupils, imparting knowledge ; but do not 
talk too much. Let them do most of the talking. 

19. Leave no points of difficulty untouched; but some- 
times ask pupils to think about a question for to-morrow. 

20. Never publicly praise individual pupils or censure 
any, beyond pronouncing answers right or wrong. 

21. Shift from the original predetermined plan only when 
sure that to do so will be more helpful to the pupils. 

22. Aim to teach mainly the middle third of the class 
rather than the upper or lower third; but neglect none. 

242 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

II. The style of passing from one recitation to another 
or to recess. Quietness yet promptness is the ideal. 
The pupils should know what to do, and do it. 

Whether there be signals on the bell or mere words 
of direction matters little. 

III. When the visit is at recess or before or after 
school, the visitor is likely to notice both the manner 
and executive ability of the teacher in the direction of 
the movements of the class and in the degree of prompt- 
ness, of orderliness, and of general courtesy one to an- 
other displayed by the pupils in their movements. 

IV. The teacher's command of the subject-matter of 
the lessons and skill in instruction, — whether this be in 
reading or in drawing or in Latin or in shop-work. Of 
our teachers, we expect adequate scholarship and satis- 
factory technique. Errors by the teacher in matters of 
fact, ignorance of or failure to understand essential prin- 
ciples, and clumsiness in the physical exercises are all 
unfortunate in the eyes of adult visitors, however blind 
the pupils may be to them. 

V. Though the visitor himself be no expert in the use 
of words, he will probably be a sharp critic of the Eng- 
lish of the teacher. It is not fluency so much as facility 
and accuracy that are required of the teacher. There 
is scarcely any one other quality of the teacher to which 
the general public is so sensitive as to his language- 
power in respect alike to grammar and to rhetoric, to 
the tones and pitch of the voice and to the excellence 
of articulation. 

Teachers who are deficient in English should them- 
selves learn memoriter smooth English prose, daily, 
until their thought is organized in the habit of clear and 
smooth oral sentence-making. They do well also to 

17 243 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

learn for oral recital, if only in their own rooms, good 
passages of both prose and verse, in order to train their 
vocal organs. For some teachers, this is a hard disci- 
pline; but the very hardness of it shows the need. Could 
such teachers hear themselves, should they have phono- 
graphic records made for later reproduction, they would 
be eager to correct their own utterance, however hard 
the labor. The teacher should speak distinctly, quietly, 
not monotonously, and with genuine interest in what 
he says. 

VI. When the visitor happens to be in the class-room 
upon an occasion of an infraction of discipline, he is cer- 
tain to note the mode and the device of correction and 
the temper of the teacher in making the correction. It 
is an absolutely invariable rule that 

A good teacher is patient and calm and kind under any 
and all circumstances. In my own experience, I have 
known (a) a principal to be struck with a stiletto that 
drew blood, (b) a woman teacher to be seized by an in- 
subordinate boy who attempted to strangle her at the 
throat, and (c) another woman teacher to be knocked 
down and jumped upon by a boy so terribly enraged 
that the other pupils were afraid to try to rescue her. 
In each case, the teacher was absolutely right from be- 
ginning to end throughout the affair, (a) The boy at- 
tacked the principal under orders from criminals who 
had been offended at his activity in trying to clean the 
neighborhood of certain nuisances, (b) The boy was 
subject to epileptic fits preceded by great nervous dis- 
order, (c) The boy was a congenital criminal. It may 
perhaps be asked whether the teachers should and did 
resist. Certainly; but in resisting, not one "lost his 
head" or was other than patient, calm and kind. It is 

244 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

perhaps needless to add that each of these cases was 
accorded a proper punishment, — viz.: (a) the reform 
school; (6) suspension until recovery of health; and 
(c) expulsion from school with assignment to a probation 
officer. It is significant indeed that when three persons 
can so conduct themselves under terrible danger as well 
as outrageous provocation, other teachers will act other- 
wise even in respect to relatively trivial matters. Act- 
ing otherwise than calmly and considerately is, of course, 
the sin of unreasonable action by man, whom God means 
to be the reasoning creature. An ecstasy of anger or 
of fear may be the fact that causes the sin, but it is 
no excuse. 
This principle may be stated negatively — viz.: 

1. Do not raise the voice to loud tones in giving reproof. 

2. Never strike any pupil at any time in the presence of 
the class beyond the extent of resistance. 1 

3. Do nothing that you may later regret: keep cool. 

4. Never use sarcasm, never: it is worse than a blow. 

By observing these principles, the teacher keeps the 
public opinion of the class upon his side, an enormous 
moral advantage. 

VII. The visitor cannot help seeing the personal rela- 
tions that exist between the teacher and the pupils. 
(a) There is a general personal relation between the 
teacher and the class as a whole. This should be that 
of a friendly superior assisting friendly inferiors: it is 
not a relation of equals, nor should there be any humble- 
ness or deference toward the pupils beyond a considerate 
hearing of their ideas. A good teacher, though always 

1 See Chapter VI, pages 146-164, as to corporal punishment. 

245 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

sympathetic with individuals, is always a little aloof 
from the class considered as a whole. Some time ago, 
I had a singular instance of the effectiveness of this 
quality of loving but impersonal superiority. A highly 
educated man of long teaching experience was assigned 
to a class of a grade with pupils averaging fourteen years 
of age. Day by day for four months, despite all his 
efforts, their conduct grew worse and worse. A woman 
much younger, scarcely half his weight of body, and a 
foot shorter, was transferred to the class. Two days 
later, she reported that she "never had a better class": 
it was her seventh year of experience. Next day, I 
visited the room. The " secret" was on the surface. 
She had won the respect of the pupils not by asking 
for it, but by assuming a quiet composure that must have 
come hard the first day at least. Later, I found upon 
inquiry that she had simply ignored the doctrine of 
punishment that first day and calmly proceeded to 
"teach school" despite actually insolent interruptions 
both by word of mouth and by free moving about the 
room. This procedure of hers fascinated the attention 
of the pupils and her own self-command won their ad- 
miration. A few days later, the transfer of a single boy 
out of the room to a class where he had no friends com- 
pleted the entire affair of reducing that disorderly room 
to excellent conduct. 

(b) There are also personal relations with each and 
every pupil. Here two rules apply. I. Have no favor- 
ites. II. Never nag: send no children to Coventry. If 
there is to be any social taboo of bad children, let it 
be on the part of the other children. By observing these 
two rules, the teacher gets the approval of the class as 
a whole, which is the best sanction for all discipline. 

246 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

Once, on a school ground, I heard three boys tell an- 
other boy, — "Say, quit bothering teacher. She's the 
best teacher in the whole school, and you know it." It 
is unnecessary to tell the rest of the story: that boy 
knew his line from that minute, and he walked the 
line. 

How far the teacher should go in helping individuals 
depends upon many considerations. A readiness to help 
each one is quickly known among the pupils; but there 
is a certain overconscientiousness on the part of some 
teachers that unduly taxes their strength. Here, as in 
all practical applications of principles, one must find 
and follow "the golden mean." Too much helping of 
individuals weakens them and wearies the teacher; not 
enough alienates the pupils and hardens the teacher's 
heart and conscience. The right amount of individual 
attention depends (a) upon the grade and the school, 
(6) upon the number of pupils, (c) upon the health of 
the teacher. 

This works out as follows — viz.: 

(a) Little children require frequent help upon small 
matters, while larger ones require occasional help upon 
great matters. (6) The larger the class, the less of in- 
dividual help should be attempted. One must consider 
the scale of one's effort, (c) A vigorous young teacher 
can do more than a less hearty and older teacher. The 
criterion is — never do so severe a day's work as to be 
incapacitated for standard work in class the next day. 
This is not only to advocate the right of the teacher to life 
and health and the joy of labor — which may be denied 
by the undiscerning. It is to advocate also the right of 
the class as a whole to an honest, helpful year's work, 
from a patient, healthy, cheerful teacher. 

247 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

VIII. The visitor is likely to note the ventilation and 
temperature of the room, the amount of light admitted 
by the windows and shades, and the manner in which 
the teacher excuses the children who desire to leave the 
room. None of these matters of sanitation, lighting and 
hygiene is entirely within the control of class-room 
teachers; and yet all so concern the health of children 
and youth as to demand attention here. 

(a) Ventilation. 1 Every school-room requires a com- 
plete renewal of fresh air at least every eight minutes. 
This can be secured only by ventilation forced by fans 
or in part by fans and in part by heated exhaust flues. 
But where there is no system of ventilation, the teacher 
can have frequent calisthenic periods when the windows 
should be thrown open and the air changed while the 
pupils are taking exercise. In case that any windows are 
left open, it is important to see that no drafts come 
directly upon the children. 2 

Even in rural school-houses, fair ventilation can be 
secured in winter by ventilating stoves, of which there 
are now many kinds upon the market. These deliver 
the heat evenly over the entire room and use actually 
less coal than the ordinary stoves that superheat the 
parts of the room near them, while the remote parts 
are cold. 

Every school-room should have exhaust flues open- 
ing near the floor to take out the foul air. It is indeed 

1 For a complete discussion of the equipment of the class-room, see 
Our City Schools: Their Direction and Management, Chapter V. 

2 Sometimes in new and admirably ventilated school-houses, the 
inlet flues blow directly upon the pupils or upon the teacher, in 
which case an immediate remedy for deflection of the air should be 
provided by some appropriate device, familiar enough to school- 
house architects. 

248 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

often difficult and sometimes impossible to persuade rural 
school communities to ventilate their schools; and yet 
even in the country districts in many parts of the land 
great progress is now being made. 1 Teachers every- 
where should understand that air once breathed is no 
more fit to be breathed again than is water once drunk 
fit for drinking. Such air is deficient in oxygen, 
loaded with carbonic-acid gas, and foul with organic 
matter. 

(6) Lighting. All the light in a school should come 
from one side, preferably the left side of the children's 
desks. Sometimes even so, too much light enters. 
There should be two shades upon each window at the 
center — one to roll up, and the other to roll down. A 
competent teacher will keep the shades from hour to 
hour properly adjusted to the pupils' needs. Especial 
care should be taken to avoid the glare of too much 
light upon the desks and the blackboards. When there 
are windows in front that the children must face, these 
should be heavily shaded. 

A front light is worse than a cross-light. Both front 
light and cross-lights cause eye-strain, headaches, and 
nervous ill-health — even in country children. Some- 
times, the boy "doesn't like school," not knowing why, 
when the real fault is not in himself but in the lighting 
of the room. 

Even in country districts, a tactful teacher can some- 
times persuade the committee or board to close up badly 
located windows and to open better ones. 

(c) Toilet necessaries. The good teacher knows that 
younger persons require to visit the toilet at more fre- 

1 Especial attention may be called to Tennessee and to New Jersey, 
but many other States also are now alive to the situation. 

249 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

quent intervals than do adults, and should take such 
requests as a matter of course. Any comment or even 
look of disapproval is entirely unbecoming. To the in- 
telligent, it displays gross ignorance. 

It is a disgraceful fact that the toilet accommodations 
of many schools are still inadequate or unclean or crim- 
inal for want of total separation of the provision for the 
sexes, by high brick walls or remoteness and seclusion from 
one another. The young woman teacher who finds her 
school improperly cared for in this matter should prompt- 
ly, vigorously and persistently keep this fact before the 
minds of the mothers of her pupils until there is com- 
plete reform. When she cannot get hearing and support 
from the mothers, she should appeal to some physician 
or minister or other veteran leader among the men of 
the community. 

Failing to secure reform, the teacher should find a 
better school elsewhere. Let her shake off the dust 
of her feet as a reproach against them. Perhaps 
later, the rebuke may awake the conscience of that 
community, as acquiescence would certainly soothe its 
sleep. 

(d) Temperature. Recently in our better school- 
houses, we have made great progress in heating the 
rooms, and we are just beginning to learn how to keep 
the air properly moist. The new standard is this: 
Temperature, 65° Fahrenheit; humidity, 70 per cent. 
The art of moistening the air shows that we can save its 
cost of operation because air at 65° heat and 70 per cent, 
humidity is as warm to the body as 75° heat and 30 
per cent, humidity. This economy is especially worth 
while in climates with long winters where the outer air 
often drops to zero and to a condition of dryness that 

250 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

at 70° Fahrenheit becomes but 10 per cent, humid- 
ity. 1 

Children living many hours in the Sahara Desert 
aridity of the unmoistened, heated air of a school-room 
become peculiarly liable to colds, to bronchitis, and to 
pneumonia. 

In rural schools heated by stoves, and in other schools 
heated by hot air from furnaces, it is easy enough to 
moisten the air by keeping a pan full of water near or 
upon or in the furnace. Teachers should see that this 
is done by the janitor or do it themselves. Where steam- 
heat is employed, the problem is more difficult. The 
teacher's own health requires this same precaution. 

IX. The professional visitor, though making no longer 
a stay than a half-hour, will notice during that time the 
written work of the pupils. And the trained and ex- 
perienced teacher, anticipating such visits, will make 
and keep collections of the written work in several sub- 
jects and of the drawings and products of the class 
manual work. A file of forty arithmetic papers upon 
the same topic tells more than one story— e.g.: 1. It 
shows the proficiency of the pupils in the arithmetic of 
their grade. 2. It shows how hard a class the teacher 
has in hand, for when at the beginning of a term some 
papers are good and yet many are poor, there has been 
an unfortunate grading, or when at the ending of the 
term, the same condition is discovered, it shows that 
the class should have been subdivided into sections, 
each assigned to work that was suitable to its powers. 
When all the papers are perfect or nearly so, the work 
is too easy. When among the papers are those last on 
the topic, they indicate how skilful has been the review- 

1 See also Ayres's Open Air Schools. 
251 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

ing. 3. The file of papers shows the handwriting 
standards of the teacher, and his or her requirements 
of neatness and orderliness. 

X. The visitor is likely to see what extra reference 
and general books the teacher has at hand for his own 
use. Every grammar and high school class-room needs 
an unabridged dictionary, and most of them need also 
a complete world's atlas. In every room where history 
and geography are taught, there should be an eigh teen- 
inch globe of the earth. These rooms also need geo- 
graphical maps and historical charts. 

XL There should be something of a collection of 
Nature-study objects and of scientific and technical ob- 
jects, — in short, the beginnings at least of a school 
museum. 

XII. Every class-room needs a small library of books 
for the pupils' own uses. Five hundred are not too 
many; but ten or twenty are better than none. 

XIII. The visitor may care to look at the teacher's 
records of attendance and of scholarship. 

XIV. The visitor should observe the clothes and shoes 
of the children, — to see whether they are neat and clean. 1 

1 In several elementary schools, I have seen boys' and girls' shoe- 
blacking clubs — membership, one cent; each shine, one cent. To 
keep it going, there have been two pupil inspectors who have passed 
through the class-rooms rapidly each morning. They have said 
nothing; but every Monday at assembly exercises, they report the 
number each day of boys and girls in each room who made an un-. 
satisfactory appearance. Two cards, to be hung outside the school- 
room door for a week, are used, one reading, "ROOM No. 1 for neat- 
ness," the other "ROOM No. 1 for improvement in neatness." 
Two pupil managers take care of the blacking-stands. Both in- 
spectors and managers are changed every week. The clubs always 
show a profit in operation. 

Of course, in actual operation, there are some cases requiring tact 

252 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

The foregoing are some of the important items to 
which the visitor of experience will give attention. He 
who calls periodically will inquire into these matters 
from time to time and into others that tell him about 
the educational process that is or should be going for- 
ward in the room. He is not likely ever to let the fore- 
going pass entirely out of his mind, for he needs them 
in helping him to form a fair judgment upon the total 
of a teacher's work for a year. These other and more 
extended inquiries are likely to concern all the matters 
treated in such a book as this, and many more. They 
will be intensive, — he will consider the special methods, 
devices, personal manners of the teacher with reference 
to the exact work he or she has in hand. When we deal 
wisely, we deal differently with first-grade children and 
with second grade, with first-year high-school youth 
and with second-year youth. Each class has its own 
problems. His inquiries will also be more extensive 
than they can be in a single visit, — extensive in two 
directions: (1) through the year, its progress or failure 
to progress; (2) the range of the teacher's influence 
with the class and in the school, the scholarship, and 
the community relations. 

It is possible, therefore, to make but a few suggestions. 

Practical class teachers are coming now to see, with 
all modern educational philosophers and philosophical 
educators, that sense-training is of great importance. 

and kindness; but this is true of everything educational. Free 
tickets for shines are given to those pupils who cannot pay the cent. 
One result has been that thrifty parents have required their children 
to clean their shoes at home. Perhaps it seems a trifling matter; 
but as between the boy whose clothes and shoes are always clean 
and presentable and the boy who looks dirty and forlorn, the world 
usually chooses the former for trial at its work. 

253 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

A good teacher is likely to test and to train his or her 
children in ways indicated perhaps as follows — viz.: 

I. Visualizing. 1. Write a new word on the black- 
board. Erase. Have it written as recalled. 2. Write a 
sentence. 3. (In higher grades) Write a stanza of verse, 
or a short paragraph. 4. Write [ . • \ \ \ for example. 
Erase. Ask the count. 5. Draw Q 1 I fl V 

° r UZJ AOD^O> IZZ1 ^ 
various orders. Erase. Ask for reproduction in that 
order. 6. Make 5" x 8" cards, and place various com- 
binations, as 8 + 11= ; .4x7= ; grape; etc., 
upon them. Show them in a flash. Ask what they 
were, etc. 7. Hold an object up for a moment. Hide 
it. Ask children to name, or perhaps to draw it. 
8. Ask number of windows in school-house. 

II. Audition. 1. Repeat several figures. Ask ver- 
batim repetition; and answer. 2. Recite a verse. 
Ask its verbatim repetition. 3. Rap on a desk several 
times. How many? 4. Rap, rap, pause, rap, pause, 
rap, rap, rap. Ask for exact repetition. 5. Tell a 
problem story in arithmetic. Ask verbatim repetition. 

III. Memory. 1. Let one child go about the room 
touching (say) ten different objects. Let others try to 
follow exactly from memory. 2. Teach a memory gem, 
perhaps in concert. See who know it accurately. 3. 
Write on the blackboard an arithmetical process, a 
spelling list, etc. Next day, ask children to reproduce 
it exactly. 4. Ask them to tell about pictures in their 
books, with the books shut. 5. Get historically accurate 
reports of excursions in the woods. 

IV. Dramatizing. 1. Tell or read a story, and let 

254 



HOW TO MAKE A GOOD SCHOOL AND CLASS 

children work it out. This is especially useful in his- 
tory and literature. 2. Dramatize arithmetic problems. 
3. Make Eskimo villages, etc. 4. In manual training, 
build things like real, or actually real. 

I have seen seventh and eighth grades, as it were, made 
new by such exercises as these persisted in for a month. 
They are indeed especially useful in the lower primary 
and upper grammar grades. When the middle grades 
and the subadolescent period have stultified a class of 
boys and girls, nothing else can quicken them so well as 
renewed sense-training. 

In making a good school that will delight parents and 
pass muster under the inspection of critics, there are 
several minor methods and devices not to be ignored. 
One is to make for each class, from year to year, to sup- 
plement the geography work, a portfolio to hold pictures, 
magazine articles, picture postal cards, newspaper clip- 
pings, well-made pupils' maps, good compositions deal- 
ing with the lands studied (or in imagination visited), in 
that grade. In but a few years, there will be several 
portfolios of great value and of greater interest to the 
pupils. The same thing can be done in history. One 
class emulates its predecessors. From this enterprise, 
the class library of books 1 also grows surprisingly. The 
children's interest arouses that of many parents. 

The folding cabinets to display the work of the pupils 
in the regular subjects, an occasional school exhibition, 
a school or class newspaper, written or printed, and an 
open day for parents are devices often successful. 

Another quickening plan is seriously to undertake as 
a class some representative enterprise, as, e. g., in Grade 

1 Many States contribute funds to school libraries, duplicating each 
dollar raised locally. 

255 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

III, constructing an Indian village, to illustrate Long- 
fellow's " Hiawatha"; or again, e. g., in a higher grade, 
to make a museum collection of many of the products 
or manufactures of the community in which the school 
is. A teacher may do this without accepting in its en- 
tirety "the culture epochs" theory of education. 

The good teacher will make much of the English work 
in the grade, by correlating it with the topics of the 
drawing, geography, history and reading, with written 
desk and blackboard compositions and with oral re- 
productions. 

He (or she) will give arithmetic verisimilitude by 
having the pupils get the actually prevailing prices and 
modes of trade in the community for the problem work; 
by having the pupils invent many of their own problems; 
and by dramatizing some of them. In lower grades, a 
make-believe grocery store is often a happy device. 

The spelling should be taught in such a way that the 
pupils know the use of each word in context, its defini- 
tion, its appearance syllabicated and solid. This will be 
taught also in close correlation with good literature. 

But it is not within the range of this treatment to 
pursue the subject of special method whether in Latin 
or in geometry, in drawing or in chemistry, in phonics or 
in sewing. Each deserves a book by itself; and indeed 
several excellent books upon various subjects are already 
written. 

In fine, the good teacher makes the good class by- 
developing its self-activity partly through interest, 
partly by his own example of fresh knowledge, of a 
progressive spirit, and of genuine enthusiasm. 



"Therefore, that which is to have true, abiding and bless- 
ing, instructive and formative effect on the child as pupil 
and scholar, and as a future active man, — independent 
employment — should not only be founded on life as it 
actually appears, should not only be connected with life, 
but should also form itself in harmony with the require- 
ments of life, of the surroundings, of the times and with 
what these offer. It should especially have an arousing and 
wakening effect upon the inner life of the child and should 
thus spontaneously germinate from within that life." — 
Froebel, Education by Development. 1836. 



1/ 



CHAPTER IX 

THE CLASS TEACHER AND THE INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

The investment of one's own life. — The extension of education. — 
Its expansion. — Teachers of the familiar subjects. — Preparation for 
the new subjects. — Agriculture. — The mechanic arts. — The business 
arts. — Domestic science. — Domestic arts. — Principles controlling 
social action in reference to educational progress.— The universal 
school. 

THE relation of education to the civilization of its 
times is always reciprocal: in part, it causes that 
civilization: in part, it is the effect. Inevitably, here 
in America, education must take its color and its mood 
from our agricultural, industrial, social and domestic 
life. Of the new developments in education, caused by 
efforts to adjust it to modern American conditions, a few 
may be suggested. 

1. Higher education is going ever higher. The uni- 
versity succeeds the college; and research work succeeds 
the university. There is no limit. 

2. Higher education is constantly increasing in the 
quantity and extent of its expression. High schools 
have doubled in the past ten years. Women's colleges 
are multiplying. More and more universities are being 
developed. In these institutions, the courses of study 
are growing ever more numerous. The variety of sub- 
jects that may be pursued in one or another department 

18 259 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

of a great university astonishes even those who keep 
in touch with higher education. 

3. Lower education grows in the enrolled number of 
pupils, in the number of teachers, in the number of 
school buildings and in costs so fast that all the pre- 
dictions even of optimists fall short. In the presence of 
a school system with 700,000 pupils and 18,000 teachers, 
even the greatest metropolitan university with 6000 
students and 1000 teachers seems small in relative 
quantity. Even our very greatest industrial enterprises 
are but small affairs compared with the greatest of our 
educational institutions. We are deceived by the rela- 
tive incomes of university presidents and of city school 
superintendents, of college professors and of school- 
teachers, when cited in comparison with those of cor- 
poration presidents and of railroad managers, of factory 
heads and of bank cashiers into supposing — carelessly — 
that education is the least serious and the least impor- 
tant of our social enterprises. But consider: there are 
more teachers in the land than physicians, lawyers, 
ministers combined. Our schools instruct 20,000,000 
youth daily. Of every one hundred of our population, 
twenty-four go to school. Of our adult population, 
one in fifty is either teaching school or making some- 
thing for use in school-construction or equipment. 
Agriculture and railroading are the only occupations re- 
quiring many more workers than education requires. 
For every woman now teaching school, there are four 
other women formerly teachers. 

This educational expansion creates a demand for two 
kinds of teachers: those who carry on the familiar sub- 
jects, and those who are able to teach the new subjects. 
Here and there in our country enough teachers are 

260 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

available, but in most regions the supply is less than 
the demand. Like every demand that must express 
itself in economic terms, it registers itself at a price that 
fluctuates, of course, above and below a median point and 
that varies in different localities; but with this limitation, 
the price is in a sense " fixed" and the demand is cer- 
tain. This demand is for teachers who know what and 
how to teach. Being unable to estimate fairly what 
constitutes a teacher, the public registers its demand 
for teachers at a price too low to secure an adequate 
supply. In consequence, taking the country by and 
large, at least one-half of the so-called "teachers" are 
not such in reality, either not knowing what to teach 
or else being without skill in teaching. Also in conse- 
quence, one-fifth of the persons engaged in teaching 
drop out from the work every year. 1 

Not one-third and scarcely one-quarter of our Ameri- 
can teachers at present are either college or normal- 
school graduates. Such is the minimum standard of 
fitness for teaching. Whatever be the price offered for 
teaching service by public opinion, the social demand 
is for really qualified teachers. For many years to 
come, the supply will be inadequate. 

But serious as the situation is regarding regular or 
ordinary teachers, ready to carry on the routine work 
and to teach the familiar subjects of education, that in 

1 Statistics do not bear out the assumption that women who cease 
to teach always do so in order to marry. They give up teaching 
(a) to help in the homes of their parents, (b) to enter other occupa- 
tions, (c) to enjoy leisure, and (d) to marry (1) because they find the 
"pay" too small to warrant the labor and anxiety; (2) because 
"politics" of one form or another has given them a disagreeable ex- 
perience; and (3) because they have not succeeded sufficiently well 
tp be happy in the work. 

2G1 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

respect to the teachers of the new subjects is far more 
serious. These relatively new subjects in secondary 
and elementary education include the following— viz.: 

1. Carpentry and other wood-working. 1 

2. Mechanical drawing. 1 

3. Forging and other iron- working. 1 

4. Machine construction. 1 

5. Plumbing and tinsmithing. 1 

6. Harness-making and other leather-working. 1 

7. Agriculture and its several subdivisions. 1 

8. The commercial branches. 1 

9. Shorthand and typewriting. 1 

10. Biology and the other natural sciences. 2 

11. Nature-study. 3 

12. Gymnastics and other physical culture. 4 

13. Sewing and dress-making. 1 

14. Millinery. 1 

15. Cookery. 1 

16. Household hygiene and sanitation. 1 

17. Health-inspection, including anthropometry. 1 

18. Feeble-mindedness. 5 

19. Incorrigibility. 6 

20. Physical deficiencies. 7 

1 In these several lines, there are even to this time, despite the 
fact that the work began a generation ago, only a few teachers who 
are high-school graduates, pedagogically trained, speakers of good 
English, and apt in the respective specialty: in short, colleagues fit 
to associate with and to share in the education of youth by "the 
regular teachers." 

2 Though we have long had chemistry and physics in our sec- 
ondary schools, and the suppty of such teachers is fairly satisfac- 
tory, teachers of the natural sciences are but few. But for the 
law of compensation in professions, — in general, the same return to 
each and all, — the salaries of the teachers of the natural sciences 
would be much higher than those of most other secondary subjects. 
Many high schools do not offer these subjects because good teachers 

262 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

The extent of the development in these new lines of 
educational endeavor may be realized when we note that 
at Tuskegee Institute over seventy different trades and 

cannot be secured — at the standard salaries of teachers of the older 
subjects. 

3 Here is a subject waiting for admission to the elementary schools 
via the supervisorship, which is requisite for the introduction of all 
new subjects and for the maintenance of every art. But there are 
few teachers in America ready to assume supervisorships in Nature- 
study. For the theory of supervisorships, see Our Schools: Their Ad- 
ministration and Supervision, Chapter VII. That class teachers who 
will fit themselves to teach Nature-study in their own grades well are 
likely to go forward rapidly in salary is known to every observer. 

4 So rapid is the progress in these two lines that it escapes the 
observation of most of those who work in them. Calisthenics is 
working out into the gymnasium, into the athletic field, and into the 
school-yard. Medical inspection is working into the school from 
medicine and surgery, and it is to stay there as a necessary integral 
part of the ordinary school routine. See pages 183-189. 

5 As the direct outcome of better health-inspection, we are opening 
schools and classes everywhere, as State institutions, as county 
homes, as parts of our city school systems, for children and youth 
who are feeble-minded, imbecile or idiot. It may be to some a 
disagreeable work; but it is in direct line with civilization, which 
has been well denned by Mitchell in his Past in the Present: What 
Is Civilization? as organized endeavor "by man in society against 
Nature to prevent her from putting into execution in his case her 
law of Natural Selection. The measure of success attained ... is 
the measure of each civilization" (page 187). To others, it is a rare 
privilege. At any rate, it is a field where the laborers are few. 

6 In all parts of the land, our cities and towns are establishing 
classes into which are collected the children who will not or cannot 
"behave." For them, teachers are required of unusual gifts and 
preparation. During my term as superintendent in the District of 
Columbia, twenty-four such classes were established. Competent 
teachers are too few. See Our City Schools: Their Direction and 
Management, Chapter VII. 

7 These include blindness, deafness, crippledness, and many other 
sorrows. Each kind of defective requires a specially trained teacher. 
High talents and fine characters are often discovered by the expert 
teacher. It is a beautiful and a happy work. 

263 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

crafts are taught, and at Hampden some forty. Nearly 
every great city now has one or more mechanic arts 
high schools. The movement that began (perhaps we 
may say) with Pratt Institute in New York (Brooklyn) 
in 1888 is certain to go on expanding, because we have 
come to learn that though instruction in a livelihood is 
not a complete education, there is no education that 
does not include as part and parcel of its course in- 
struction in at least one livelihood to the point of the 
economic standard of fitness in its art or craft. 1 There 
are some twelve hundred different standard occupations 
followed by the men and women of our land. Of these, 
of course, by far the most important are those con- 
cerned in agriculture. That our high schools should 
teach these five subjects in their elements, — viz., agri- 
culture, 2 metallurgy, business, garment - making, the 
household arts, — is a proposition no longer seriously 
challenged: it has become an educational principle. 
Our case now involves but two more stages, — getting 
the money, 3 and preparing the teachers. Strange as it 
may seem, it appears that the first lags upon the delay 
of the second. We have at last the inspiration to 
educate our people for social efficiency, which is one 
element of a sound public morality, and we have the 

1 See A Theory of Motives, Ideals and Values in Education, Chapter 
XII, "Efficiency," and Chapter XV, "Art." 

2 Abraham Lincoln changed the whole situation in America in re- 
spect to agricultural education by signing the bill to establish agri- 
cultural colleges in all the States. In his administration, James 
Buchanan had vetoed a similar bill. 

3 To those who desire a convincing argument, I commend Eliot's 
More Money for the Public School; and to those who desire to know 
what is actually being done now in the way of preparing teachers, 
I suggest investigation of the Teachers'* College of Columbia Uni- 
versity, New York City. 

264 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

philosophy to justify and bulwark the inspiration. What 
we need are the men and the disposition to deliver the 
means. For in truth, we have the means. We now 
have an economic civilization that produces surplus 
wealth. 1 We have $120,000,000,000 of wealth for 
90,000,000 people, more or less. There is an ample 
surplus for all our educational needs, of which to-day 
the greatest are these here cited, — the school courses 
and the teachers. 

It remains at this final stage of the treatment of the 
present subject to consider something of the methods of 
teaching these several subjects, generally considered, of 
which each one includes many branches. 

Agriculture. This includes chemistry of the soil, 
drainage, irrigation and rainfall, climate and weather, 
preparation of the soil, fertilizing, the seeds of the many 
various kinds of plants, seed-raising, storing, testing, 
and distribution, cultivation of the soil, harvesting, 
crop-storing, rotation of crops, orchards, small fruits, 
cereals, vegetables, flowers, shrubs, horses, cattle, sheep, 
swine, poultry, stock-breeding, birds, feeding, ensilage, 
farm machines, tools and implements, butter and cheese 
making, barns, stables, hot-houses, winter frames, 
poultry-houses, and other buildings, the employment 
of labor, marketing, bookkeeping, farm periodicals, ex- 
periment stations, veterinary medicine: in short, an 
entire system of life with its essential arts, crafts, and 
applied sciences. And yet this system lends itself of 
necessity to pedagogical methods. It is a system to 
which an introduction may be afforded by a single 
teacher in but a year's course of a lecture hour and a 
laboratory hour daily; and it is a system that a student 

1 See Patten's New Basis of Civilization. 
265 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

may well pursue for half a dozen years in a secondary 
school followed by an agricultural college. 

Each topic in agricultural instruction has its own 
typically indicated method. Some topics should be 
taught inductively; others deductively; others by ex- 
emplification exercises; still others in the scientific 
laboratory. Characteristically, agriculture is an ap- 
plied science while farming and gardening are arts. One 
learns to plough by being shown how, by being directed 
while trying, by trying independently, and then by prac- 
tise with a critic and without. One learns what fertilizer 
or reducing chemical or new constituent, — sand, clay, 
lime, phosphate, — to use upon a given soil partly 
by physical and chemical tests scientifically made, 
partly by experimentation outdoors. In this stage 
of our knowledge of agriculture, one is taught 
deductively the principles of rotation of crops. We 
shall make great progress in the teaching of agriculture 
as soon as our practice in its instruction has been cleared 
up by due consideration of the principles and methods 
applicable to its several branches. Empiricism must 
give way to scientific method in agriculture as it already 
has given way in so many other fields of education. 

As manual training in the elementary schools is the 
key to the mechanic arts in the high school, so garden- 
ing is the key to the agricultural arts. As manual train- 
ing has its allies in drawing and in physical culture, so 
gardening has its allies in Nature-study and in element- 
ary science. And as manual training has come into our 
elementary schools through the special teacher and 
supervisor, so gardening is coming in through the special- 
ist. We should not expect the "regular class teacher" 
to u know everything." Upon consideration of the mat- 

266 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

ter, we should never have expected one woman to teach 
each day to forty-five or fifty boys and girls all that they 
have the power to learn that day. We are bravely out- 
growing the notion that a school with fifteen classes 
needs but fifteen teachers and one with sixty classes 
but sixty teachers. It took the South a long time to 
learn that a principal who " merely supervises" is re- 
quired in every school-house with over three or four 
hundred pupils. 1 We are now organizing our larger 
schools with principals and principals' clerks, heads of 
departments for every twenty classes, special teachers 
of drawing, manual training, sewing, physical culture, 
the incorrigibles, the defectives. Several cities already 
have put into each of their schools a teacher whose 
main business is to go about helping individuals who 
are lagging behind: she helps them to pick up "dropped 
stitches," and she saves many of them from demotions. 
Gardening, as a school subject, has its typical lesson 
method. In order to teach it properly, there are re- 
quired (1) boxes of soil for seeding; (2) seeds of various 
kinds; (3) such tools for indoor and outdoor use as 
spades, trowels, rakes, hoes, all of small sizes for the 
pupils and a full-size set for the teacher; 2 (4) sunlighted 
grounds of sufficient size to give at least a plot 4' x 8' 
to each pair of pupils; 3 (5) such fertilizers and chemicals 

1 See Our Schools, page 178; Our City Schools, page 33. 

2 For a Grade IV class of forty-five pupils, the outfit should not cost 
over $10, and the current cost for operating its garden should not be 
over $4.50 — that is, 10 cents per capita. The vegetable crops, such 
as squash, lettuce, tomatoes, potatoes, should make a profit; but the 
class should grow also wheat, corn, strawberries, blackberries, and 
the familiar flowers such as geraniums, nasturtiums, dandelions, 
roses, lilies of the valley. 

3 A maximum plot for one boy ten years old is 6' x 16'. Anything 
larger than this intensively cultivated will discourage him as a 

267 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

as are indicated by the physical and chemical condition 
of the soil and by the needs of the crops to be grown; 
(6) water conveniently accessible; (7) a teacher who 
knows and loves growing things, which are mysterious 
kinds of silent intelligences and sympathies; (8) teil 
minutes of time daily all the year, and an hour each 
week during the planting and growing season. 

The term of a course in gardening is usually the dura- 
tion of the process from breaking up the ground for 
seeding to clearing it up after the harvest; in practice, 
we break up the course into topics, lessons, and ex- 
ercises. This may be illustrated in the case of lettuce. 

Topic 1. Telling about lettuce, showing the seeds, and 
pictures or drawings of the plant. 

Exercise 1. Spading the gardens. 

Topic 2. Telling about soil preparation, including fer- 
tilizers. 

Exercise 2. Preparing the window-boxes or the seedling 
grounds outdoors for growing the seedlings. 

Exercise 3. Getting the soil of the garden ready for the 
seedlings. 

Exercise 4. Planting the seeds in the boxes (or in the 
seeding-plot). 

Topic 3. Teaching the history of the plant growth. 

Exercise 5. Watering and caring for the seeds and the 
shoots, including thinning out. 

Exercise 5. Transplanting. 

school exercise under a teacher's direction. The teacher may have a 
class plot in his charge upon which he is to be helped by his pupils, 
almost any area, even as much as a quarter-acre. This is to assume 
that the class teacher helps the specialist, or does the work, or that a 
rural school is under consideration. The most common mistake 
in installing gardening in our schools at present is trying to do too 
much at the beginning. 

268 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

Exercise 6. Cultivation through the season of growth. 

Topic 4. The chemistry of growth in an elementary way, 
including sunlight and chlorophyl. 

Exercise 5. Gathering the first large plants and washing 
them for use: then the next, etc. 

Topic 5. Weeds. 

Exercise 6. Clearing the ground for another season or 
another crop. 

Topic 6. Rotation of garden crops. 

Of course, only a part of the grounds will be given 
over to lettuce; and while this course is going on, there 
will be others for beets, strawberries, and whatever else 
is to be grown. It is desirable to include the two and 
three year plants like strawberries and blackberries in 
order to teach foresight and carefulness. 

In our city school systems, we have now supervisors 
of drawing, of music, of manual training, of penmanship, 
of reading, of Nature-study, of the classes for defectives 
and incorrigibles, and in one instance, — the District of 
Columbia, — of gardening, and even consulting psychol- 
ogists with their assistants. In the District of Colum- 
bia, there are over one hundred of such specialists. 
New York City has an equal proportion, and more wisely 
apportioned among the subjects. Similar developments 
are appearing in hundreds of towns and cities. It might 
be considered invidious to mention any of them by 
name lest others equally meritorious appear to be neg- 
lected. But while hundreds of communities are pro- 
gressive, other hundreds are not; and some are actually 
opposed to the notion that boys and girls can get better 
instruction from several teachers than from one. This 
opposition is on a plane with the notion that however 
large a family a mother has, she needs no servant, but 

260 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

"ought to do her own work." As a matter of fact, the 
woman teacher who, without the assistance of any special 
supervisor, teaches arithmetic, grammar, geography, 
spelling, elementary science, and manages the class suc- 
cessfully, and who, with the assistance of special super- 
visors, teaches the class drawing, reading, writing, 
physical culture, and sewing well may properly be con- 
sidered an industrious and useful citizen, even though 
special teachers take the pupils occasionally for in- 
struction in manual training, in cookery, in dress- 
making, and in gardening. It is not a question whether 
the teacher has enough work to do so as not to be idling 
about: it is solely a question of the good of the pupils 
and of the ultimate welfare of our country through an 
intelligent, efficient, and moral citizenship. 1 

It is sometimes objected that there is no use in teach- 
ing agriculture in city schools. If by teaching agri- 
culture any city boys and girls can be induced to go 
out into the country and to live upon the bounty of 
Nature, that will be a blessing to them. The telephone 
and the mail have done away with country isolation. 
The prices of farm, garden, and orchard products 
show that we have not enough farmers, gardeners, and 

1 1 met the argument in its crudest form when a board discharged 
one of three special supervisors, asserting that "when she goes into 
the rooms, the teachers sit around doing nothing. We don't pay 
for loafing. We want the teachers to work." When I asked why 

the other two were retained, the leader replied, "Miss G was born 

here, and has some rights." "And as to Mr. L ?" I asked. The 

reply was, "He votes." The discharged specialist was "a transient " 
and "only a woman." But underneath all the apparent situation 
was the fundamental opinion that, beyond the one-grade one-teacher 
complement of teachers, all other teachers are " extras." It is child- 
ishly crude, but it is a fact. Some class teachers themselves cherish 
the same opinion. 

270 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

orchardists. Life on a good farm or ranch is the best 
life in the world; here the race of vigorous humanity is 
maintained; here men and women learn from Nature 
how in patience to possess their souls; here self-reliant 
citizens and sympathetic neighbors are reared. Okla- 
homa did well to put into her State Constitution the 
provision that agriculture shall be taught forever in all 
her schools, urban as well as rural. 

The one problem of importance in respect to agricult- 
ural instruction is getting the teachers. It is to-day 
the greatest field in practical pedagogy, for like every 
other subject taught in education, agriculture must be 
analyzed and reduced to a consistent body of sciences, 
arts, methods, devices, topics in due order and relation. 
We shall need many kinds of text-books and many 
kinds of teachers. Those are indeed ignorant of history 
and devoid of foresight who do not see that by the year 
2000 a.d. self-support on farms and ranches will be the 
mode of livelihood of a hundred million people in the 
rich Mississippi Valley, in irrigated regions of the Rocky 
Mountains, and in drained regions of our Gulf Coast. 
We are on the edge of new times. A shortage of food- 
supplies is upon us and will force us back to the ancestral 
wholesome outdoor life of farmer, gardener, orchardist, 
forester, shepherd, and cowherd. 1 But it will be a life of 
social relations and of high personal intelligence, for the 
agriculturist will be like many another of his fellow- 
men an applied scientist, the intellectual product of 
school and college teachers. 

Mechanic Arts. Many as are the topics visible even 
at present in the relatively new science and art of agri- 

1 It is, however, not to be forgotten that part of this shortage is 
due to a sinful system of marketing crops from producer to consumer. 

271 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

culture, those belonging in the field of the arts and crafts 
of industrial life are yet many times more. They in- 
clude shoemaking and other leather- working; silk, wool, 
cotton, flax textile manufactures; mining of coal, iron, 
copper, lead, silver, gold; the working of each of the 
metals, including jewelry, steel, bronze; lumbering, 
furniture-making; the making of every kind of instru- 
ment and tool and machine, from a water-power turbine 
plant to a watch; printing and its related arts of book, 
magazine, and newspaper manufacture; construction of 
buildings; strength of materials; stone-quarrying; ce- 
ment-manufacture; road-making; the employment of 
labor; mechanic arts periodicals. 

As gardening is the type of all farming, so carpentry 
is the type of all mechanic arts. The duration of a gar- 
dening course is from seeding to harvesting, while that 
for carpentry is from collecting the material to exhibit- 
ing the finished product. The agricultural process is 
longer and more complicated, more subject to accidents 
beyond control and to errors of ignorance, requires 
patience and faith as well as industry and intelligence; 
and yet the chance of success in it is greater for the 
pupil-novice than it is in the case of the mechanical 
process. 

The typical lesson in mechanic arts is distinctly one of 
exemplification: it is a psychological exercise. 1 In car- 
pentry or bench work as it is usually taught in the high- 
est grade of the elementary school, nearly all lessons are 
psychological exercises. The few exceptions are nearly 
all of them of a deductive nature. In all arts, we learn 
from example and emulative endeavor. 

In the pursuit of mechanic art beyond the elementary 

1 See pages 50-54. 

272 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

manual training, we must specialize early in order to 
acquire the technique while young and plastic. The 
condition of the American mind in respect to mechanic 
arts is far different from that in respect to agriculture: 
it is far more complete in its knowledge, more exact, 
more thorough, more advanced. Scientific method in 
agriculture is in the making: technical method in the 
mechanic arts is already established. In them we have 
a multitude of the skilful; and applied scientists and 
scientific inventors abound. In the use of the mechanic 
arts in high schools, we are far ahead of our record in 
agriculture. And yet we are by no means at the goal 
that we must attain in order to realize both the full 
natural genius of our people and a sound philosophy of 
education. We need more teachers of manual training 
and of all the arts and crafts that follow. The purpose 
of manual training (which is a very general and discon- 
certingly vague term for any and all kinds of exercises 
whose motive is tool-using or tool-learning) is such or- 
ganic training of soul-and-body, of eye-brain-hand, of 
ear-brain-hand, of efferent nerves — conscious ganglia — 
association areas and plexuses — efferent nerves — as to 
furnish the youth with aptitude for and interest in 
mechanic art. 1 

It is a conservative estimate that the school world 
could absorb within one year ten times as many men 

1 To illustrate the difficulty of getting and keeping a competent 
special mechanic art teacher. — In the William McKinley High 
School, Washington, D. C, in 1906-7, in one position alone, there 
were five different teachers and yet the position was vacant three 
months in the ten months of the year. Why? As soon as they 
were appointed, the good men immediately secured better positions 
(i. e., higher salaries) in practical man factures, and the others failed 
promptly for want of proper pedagogical training. ■ 

273 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

and women of really adequate preparation for teachers 
of the mechanic arts as will offer themselves at any time 
for half a dozen years to come. There is an especial 
shortage of competent supervisors of elementary manual 
training. "It is so hard to get a really good man" is 
the common saying of school superintendents. And 
without good men at the current prices of teachers' ser- 
vices, we cannot extend our manual and mechanic arts 
work. We are indeed in "a vicious circle"; we have 
too few teachers and too few graduates who may return 
to the schools as additional teachers. But the pro- 
gressive tendency, nevertheless, is fully established; and 
a half-century will tell a surprising story not of less lit- 
erary and classical high schools and courses, but of far 
more technical high schools and of technical courses in 
all general high schools. 

Just as objection is made to teaching agriculture in 
city schools because "we don't farm in cities," so ob- 
jection is made to teaching mechanic arts in rural schools, 
elementary and secondary, because "factories don't grow 
upon farms." But we are coming into an age when 
factories will grow in the suburbs of cities, and when 
the farm boy with "the mechanical turn of mind" (i. e., 
of the muscular-motor temperament plus an energetic 
intellect) will have a fair opportunity in a near-by cen- 
tralized high school. 

Our boys and girls are born in city and in country 
with various powers, and they should have the corre- 
sponding opportunities. Not all who are born in the city 
are best adapted to factories and stores and offices; not 
all who are born in the country are best adapted to 
farms and gardens and orchards. The son of the miner 
need not be a miner; the son of the lawyer need not be 

274 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

a lawyer. We have put away caste. We must put 
away regional specialization. It is, of course, to some 
a matter of indifference what they do, whether teach 
school, run a farm, mine coal or clerk in a store; and 
these are likely to do all things indifferently well or ill. 
Therefore, we need to open to all the gateways to all 
ordinary opportunities, — that is, to many various liveli- 
hoods. It is new doctrine quite radical, probably revo- 
lutionary; but it has two limitations, not the boy for 
the sake of the trade but the trade for the sake of the 
boy, and let the boy (or girl) have, first, last and all the 
time between, a genuine, broad, optimistic liberal edu- 
cation. The livelihood is incidental, though necessary; 
the life is an end-in-itself. The livelihood is a means 
to the life. 

Business or the Commercial Arts. These include arith- 
metic, penmanship, English, bookkeeping, accounting, 
business methods, banking, retailing, wholesaling, sales- 
manship, shorthand, typewriting, correspondence, office 
files, history of commerce, commercial geography, ad- 
vertising, window-display, clerking, stock-taking, stor- 
age, transportation, auditing, commercial law, science 
of government, supervision of manufacturing, political 
economy, ethics, real estate, stocks and bond, commis- 
sions, life, fire, burglary and accident insurance, taxes, 
bonding of employes, purchase of materials and of sup- 
plies, commercial agencies, savings-banks, employment 
of labor, commercial publications. 

As the key to the mechanic arts is manual training, 
and to agriculture is gardening, so the key to the busi- 
ness arts is bookkeeping. We may begin our gardening 
with the ten-year-old boys and girls, and our manual 
training with twelve-year-old pupils; but we are not 

19 275 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

likely to make much headway in bookkeeping with pupils 
under sixteen years of age. For it, not only are a 
thorough knowledge of arithmetic and much skill in it 
requisite, but there is requisite also a considerable de- 
velopment of reasoning, of judgment, and of general 
information. Like most arts, when well performed, 
bookkeeping " looks easy." 

A lesson in bookkeeping is essentially deductive in its 
character, and most of our work in the subject is at 
the fourth stage of the deductive lesson, — repetition 
and drill. 1 But after the mastery of bookkeeping and 
associated subjects, the business arts so increase in va- 
riety and in number that in their lessons the use of every 
kind of pedagogical method is indicated in one or more 
of the subjects of the course; e. g., the inductive method 
in the history of commerce; the deductive in commercial 
law; the exemplification method in typewriting; and 
the lecture in costs of materials and of supplies. 

In one respect, the business arts may be ranked higher 
than either agriculture or the mechanic arts. A failure 
in their practical application in life is, in a sense, more 
serious than a failure in agriculture or the mechanic arts, 
for business deals with the finished goods made by other 
persons while agriculture and manufacture produce the 
goods. In other words, business deals with property in 
the course of its exchange for other property, usually 
money, while agriculture and manufacture create the 
property. Business gets the merchandise in a state just 
preceding its consumption or other use by customers. 2 

1 See page 44, above. 

2 Here it is necessary to draw a sharp, well-understood distinction. 
Selling a wheat crop is not agriculture but business; therefore, a 
farmer should be in part a business man or merchant. Selling shoes 

276 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

The man who fails in raising a crop on his farm can 
bide his time and raise another. The land and tools 
remain. Only the seed and the time have been lost. 
The mechanic who spoils a piece of steel can try 
again. But the incompetence or "hard luck" of the 
merchant eats away his capital fast and creates dis- 
trust among many men. He stands higher up in the 
economic structure. His purchases are orders to farm- 
ers and manufacturers and control them. Hence, the 
banker is highest of all in the economic scale, for his 
loans govern the economic life of a community. Upon 
the extent of their credit with him, other men rise and 
fall. And hence again business courses require as stu- 
dents older youth than do courses in even mechanic 
arts and much older than do agricultural courses; for 
"good judgment," which involves a considerable famili- 
arity with affairs, is the essence of business success. 

All the foregoing has been presented " in a sense" ; that 
is, with qualifications which now appear. Agriculture 
deals with Nature outdoors; mechanic art with materials 
usually indoors; and business only with products. A 
good agriculturist is something of a scientist and much 
of a Nature student; the mechanic must be something 
of an artist; but the business man needs only the more 
common, the fundamental human qualities. Of these, 
the agriculturist must have deeper and truer relations 
with and insight into the world whence man has issued 
and by which he is supported than either of his fellows; 
he lives the largest life, the most natural and the least 
artificial. He owes to both the mechanic and the clerk 
much charity. And the good teacher of any of these 

is not manufacture but business; therefore, the manufacturer must 
understand merchandising. 

277 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

lines should bring his students into sincere appreciation 
of their comparative values and opportunities. Life on 
a farm is in itself worth while ; life in a manufactory may 
be worth while; but handling other people's products 
can scarcely in itself be joyous. 

The Domestic Sciences and Arts (garment-making and 
householdry). These include sewing, tailoring, dress- 
patterns, cutting-and-fitting; purchasing materials and 
supplies; machine-sewing: millinery; babies' clothes; gar- 
ments (outer and under) for boys, youth, and men, and 
for girls, misses, and women; cookery, the chemistry of 
foods; purchasing meats, vegetables, and other pro- 
visions; refrigeration, winter-storage; household sani- 
tation, house-cleaning, purchase of furniture, tableware, 
bed-linen; heating, airing, lighting; care of the sick 
and of the injured; care of babies and children; house- 
decoration; employment of labor; service and the di- 
rection of service; fuel, oil, gas, electricity; plumbing; 
insect pests; rodents; garbage; household waste; ac- 
counts, bills, auditing, bank-accounts, household periodi- 
cals; home-making; and oversight of children's games 
and amusements. 

Here we have five elementary key-subjects, — sewing, 
cooking, nursing, house-cleaning and planning. Of these, 
the first three may be introduced in simple forms into 
the elementary school. Most of the others are well 
within the range of high-school girls when taught by 
competent teachers. 

The typical lessons in sewing and cooking are essen- 
tially exercises exemplified by the teachers. Nursing, 
however, is best taught by the use of lectures illustrated 
partly by stereopticon slides or by other pictures and 
partly by going through some of the processes with 

278 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

models simulating illness or accident. Fortunately the 
advances already made in actual practice by teachers 
of the domestic sciences 1 and arts. But much of the 
ground to be covered in these fields requires informa- 
tional lectures and inductive recitations. 

To teach these domestic sciences and arts properly, 
we shall have to give up our notion that though married 
men are preferable to bachelors as superintendents, as 
principals, and as class teachers, unmarried women are 
preferable to mothers in any and all educational posi- 
tions. "The majority of our teachers of boys and girls 
above twelve years of age should be husbands or wives, 
fathers or mothers. . . . These are none too experienced, 
none too wise to manage the boys and girls of other 
parents." 2 It is especially true in these subjects that 
the best teachers come from the ranks of the mothers, 
whether wives or widows matters but little. The cult 
of celibacy for women teachers is absurd and dangerous 
in every aspect; but it is a wrong to our girls to deprive 
them here of unquestionably the best-equipped teach- 
ers. Of course, our teachers of the domestic sciences 
and arts must be pedagogically trained, but the inter- 
vention of marriage should be no bar anywhere. It no 
longer is in New York City or in the District of Colum- 
bia (since 1906). And again, of course, wives and widows 
are not to be preferred necessarily against otherwise 
superior teachers, but they should be preferred, "other 
things being equal," in all subjects of instruction that 
concern that fundamental and sacred institution, the 
home. 

1 Cookery is a "science" according to the peculiar usage now pre- 
vailing in this general department, while sewing is, an "art." 

2 A Theory of Motives, Ideals and Values in Education, page 173. 

279 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

While we owe to the exigencies of our social situation 
alike the inspiration and the pressure to undertake the 
greatly increased activities of the modern school, we 
owe to the kindergarten movement and to its leaders 
the pedagogy of the new education in the earlier years 
at school, in which these activities find their source. 
We cannot successfully develop domestic science, com- 
mercial art, agriculture, and the other new subjects until 
we have in our primary schools both psychological exer- 
cises and informational studies. The school arts are 
not enough as preparation for modern life. We need 
also the self-expressive activities, 1 which include games 
and plays; construction in cardboard and other ma- 
terials; weaving, knotting, braiding; modelling in sand 
and in clay; drawing; painting in water-color and in 
ink; dramatization of number operations, of stories, 
and of pictures; and the old writing on paper and black- 
board as well. These psychological exercises are com- 
ing into the school not in opposition to or for the elimina- 
tion of the 3 R's, but to enlarge, to encircle, to confirm 
and to illuminate them. 

In the same way the new informational studies are 
not to displace reading, but to develop in the child 
motives for reading and apperceptive masses by which 
to interpret the printed page. Story-telling comes be- 
fore beginning of teaching to read, and yet is also its 
finest accompaniment, because by it the ear reinforces 
the eye. Let us therefore daily tell stories,— true ones 

1 We are indebted to Miss Ada Van Stone Harris, Assistant Su- 
perintendent of Schools, Rochester, New York, both for the phrase 
and for its realization in practice in a large system of city schools. 
An " expressive activity " is a " psychological exercise." For the psy- 
chology of such exercises see O' Shea's Dynamic Factors in Education. 

280 



THE CLASS TEACHER AND INDUSTRIAL ARTS 

of history, of biography, of everyday life; myths; 
poems; even fairy stories when the ethical or esthetic 
lesson is clear and apt. And let us have Nature-study. 
Is there any other way to redeem the city child than by 
the way of Nature? And does not Nature-study teach 
even the country child what and how to see and why 
things are as they are? 

In our new, vast enterprise of educational expansion, 
several principles should control our social action. So 
controlling that action, they will serve as inducements 
to draw more of our ablest and best young men and 
women into the work of professional education. 

Of these, the first principle is that education is neces- 
sary in order to preserve from generation to generation 
the heritage of culture, such an education as in fact does 
transmit that heritage in full. 

The second principle is that the true motive to cause 
us to educate our youth consists in our love for them 
individually, and in our consequent desire, purpose, in- 
tention, plan, and practice of educating each one of them 
to the full of his (or her) powers, to the end that each 
may live a useful, happy and successful life. 

The third principle is that in a great and complicated 
civilization, we set apart a sufficient number of suffi- 
ciently educated persons to do for us this twofold 
work, — of transmitting culture and of educating youth 
thereby. 

The fourth principle is that since, in the final analysis, 
there is no difference in the merit of individuals and 
there is a limitless demand of humanity for the best in- 
dividuals that can be produced, we should educate each 
to the reasonable limits of his powers both for his own 
sake and for that of humanity. 

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CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Therefore, we are seeking to build "the universal 
school" coequal with the universal State and a restored 
universal Church, each mutually dependent upon the 
other and yet within the limits of organized society in- 
dependent of one another. To be specific: Our school 
shall be as separate from politics as from ecclesiasticism, 
a non-political and a non-religious social institution, the 
home and medium of all the arts and sciences, liberal 
and applied, ultimate and mediate, for all persons of 
whatever ages, free and universal, at once useful and 
cultural, because aiming to educate an eternal being 
whose duty nevertheless is in this present world. 



"The subject that involves all other objects, and there 
fore the subject in which the education of every one should 
culminate, is the theory and practice of education." — 
Herbert Spencer, Education. 1860. 



CHAPTER X 

THE TEACHER'S OWN LIFE IN AN AGE OF EDUCA- 
TIONAL EXPANSION 

Relations with superior officers. — Questions usually asked of can- 
didates for positions. — Progress in scholarship. — One's library. — 
Health. — Recreation. — Vacations. — Public, private, endowed, and 
ecclesiastical school positions. — Elementary, secondary, and higher 
positions. — Learning some of the lessons of life. 

HOW to invest one's life is a question that many of 
us take up too late in life to answer freely. When 
taken up too early, we often answer it unwisely. A cur- 
rent has carried most of us into whatever social river we 
happen to be in now. Education is such a social river. 
Many different currents bring teachers into it. For those 
of us who are teachers and educators, it is highly im- 
portant to feel that for ourselves no other work could 
be equally delightful. There must be joy in the working. 

There is, in truth, for sincere souls a matchless oppor- 
tunity in education to invest one's life joyously and 
profitably as concerns the things that really count, — 
friendship, social service, art and science, self-develop- 
ment, freedom from strife and quarrel. That it is 
pleasanter to associate with youth and with children 
than with ambitious, jealous, pleasure-loving, money- 
seeking, disillusioned adults, most of them discouraged, 
some elated, few who have known both the societies of 
adults and of youth will doubt. 

But the question that comes to the man or woman 

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CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

who is already a teacher and who may be a teacher of 
teachers is not upon the desirability or upon the ad- 
visability of being a teacher: it is rather upon how to 
live a happy and a useful life as a teacher. 

In respect to this matter, I venture a few suggestions. 
For the first consideration, it is worth while to note that- 
being useful is, for most persons, about half of happi- 
ness. To be useful is to be able and willing to do what 
society needs to have done. The rest of happiness con- 
sists in part in doing what in itself one likes to do, and 
in part in being where one likes to be, and for the rest 
in getting for one's industry a sufficient return to go 
on living without anxiety for the morrow for one's 
self and one's natural dependents. 

For the second consideration, it is worth while to 
know how to get along with one's "superiors," for in 
"the business of teaching," which is livelihood by social 
favor, every one has superiors. The hierarchy of a city 
public school system is a very complicated matter, — 
and one different in the different States and even in the 
different cities of the same State. In the Union (City) 
District of Norwalk, Connecticut, it is as follows — viz.: 

State Constitution 

Governor and Legislature 

State Board of Education 

Town of Norwalk Meeting (of all citizens) 

Town Board of Estimate and Taxation 

Town Board of School Visitors 

Union (City of South Norwalk, etc.) District Meeting 

(of all citizens) 

Union District School Committee 

District (City) Superintendent 

Principals and Supervisors 

Class Teachers 

Pupils 

286 



THE TEACHER'S OWN LIFE 

In the city of Paterson, New Jersey, the hierarchy is 
quite different — viz.: 

State Constitution 

Governor and Legislature 

State Board of Education 

State Superintendent of Public Instruction 

State Board of Examiners 

County of Passaic Superintendent of Public Instruction 

Mayor of the City of Paterson 

Board of School Estimate 

Board of Education 

Board of City Examiners 

City Superintendent of Public Instruction 

Supervisors and Principals 

Class Teachers 

Pupils 

For practical working purposes, in Norwalk, the con- 
trol is actually in the hands of two bodies — viz., the town 
board of estimate and the union district meeting; in Pat- 
erson, it is in the hands of the mayor, for he appoints the 
board of education and thereby also controls the board 
of school estimate. I use these cities merely as examples. 
Young teachers and teachers who have seldom been out- 
side of their own home-communities have very strange 
notions as to the main rulers of public school affairs. 

Compared with city school conditions, how simple are 
those of the rural districts in many States, where the 
teacher in actual practice needs only to "get on" with 
the chairman of a small school committee! When, as 
in New Jersey, the tenure of an experienced teacher is 
not controlled at all by the board of education or any 
other school authority but by the regular law courts, 

287 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

the problem of the relations with superiors becomes very- 
simple. It consists in performing one's daily duties, in 
living a decent and moral life, and in being polite and 
kind and yet self-respectful. One who meets these 
three conditions not only holds office until retired on 
municipal or State pension or both, but is likely to be 
happy. 

But in most States, how to get along with one's supe- 
riors is a matter to which the teacher must give constant 
attention. Even so, from change of superiors or from 
their caprice, even good teachers frequently must give 
way to others. In such a state of affairs, I venture but 
a few suggestions — viz.: 

1. Be courteous. 

2. When asked to do wrong, resign or make open war. 

3. Obey in full all other orders, requests, suggestions, 
even whims of superiors. 

4. Make but few suggestions to them. Make those few 
respectfully but clearly. Do not be disappointed when they 
are not heeded. The superior may have yet other superiors. 

5. Remember that you yourself may be in error and try 
to get the truth about yourself. 

6. Assume that professional superiors know more than 
you do and talk to- them freely as friends, when you can; 
assume that lay superiors know less, know too little to 
warrant conveying to them much information about the 
school. They will probably consider it at best as " school 
gossip," at less as foolish, at worst as malicious, even 
though it be truthful and really kind. 

7. Remember that every art and every profession is es- 
sentially esoteric. What you have taken years to learn, the 
public are not likely to grasp in a few sentences. 

8. In relation to all others than your children, look upon 
your own work as essentially for self-culture, But work 

288 



THE TEACHER'S OWN LIFE 

for the children unselfishly. After all, the public supports 
you at their expense for the sake of their children. As a 
teacher, your class work is your "reason for being." 

If for any reason you desire to get a new position as 
a teacher, consider for what kind of teacher employers 
are looking. Here are a few examples of the questions 
that superintendents ask regarding applicants for posi- 
tions and that boards of examiners ask regarding appli- 
cants for licenses. They serve to show what systematic 
observers have in mind when they are "marking" 
teachers, an unpleasant but a necessary duty when one 
must deal with many teachers. 

These questions may be set forth under various 
heads. Perhaps those cited here are as useful as any 
others. 

Character. 1. Has the teacher a good moral char- 
acter? 2. Does he (or she) bear an unblemished repu- 
tation in the community? 3. Has he any unfortunate 
qualities? 4. What is his general influence in the com- 
munity? 5. Does he take any interest in the general 
welfare (a) of the school? (b) of the community? 6. Is 
he (a) reliable? (b) patient? (c) courteous? (d) indus- 
trious? (e) fond of his pupils? 7. What do the parents 
think of him (or her) ? 

Scholarship. 1. Has the teacher thorough general 
scholarship? 2. Has he had adequate prof essional train- 
ing? 3. If not, what is the nature of his deficiency? 
4. Is he progressive? 5. Does he stimulate his pupils 
to study by reason of his own example? 6. Is he 
studious now? 7. Has he any special proficiency (a) in 
music, (b) in drawing, (c) in manual work, (d) in any 
other craft, art or applied science? 8. Has he a good 

289 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

stock of general information? 9. Is he discriminat- 
ing and judicious in his comments upon current affairs? 
10. Does he speak good English? 11. Has he ability 
to write well? 12. Can he interest his pupils in his 
narratives and descriptions? 

Instruction. 1. Does he teach essentials? 2. If not, 
what inessentials does he tend to magnify? 3. Do his 
pupils acquire good habits? 4. If not, why not? 
5. Does he use appropriate methods in giving instruc- 
tion in each of his several subjects? 6. Does he corre- 
late topics capable of such association? 7. Does he 
employ modern devices? 8. Is he improving in the 
technique of instruction? 9. Does he plan his work, 
and pursue a suitable daily program? 10. Does he use 
a due amount of review and of drill? 11. Is he earnest 
in his work as an instructor? 12. Does he visit other 
teachers to observe their methods? 13. Is he over- 
inclined to new devices? — Is he a routinist? Or does 
he follow a golden mean? 14. Does he neglect de- 
tails? 15. Are his tests and examinations thorough 
and complete? 16. Does he use an appropriate amount 
of written work? 17. Does he talk himself or make his 
pupils talk ? 18. Has he the power to make his pupils 
attend to and carry out his directions? 

Discipline. 1. Does he get and keep order? 2. By 
what methods and means? 3. Does he give sufficient 
attention (a) to the general management of his class? 
(6) of the discipline of individuals? 4. Is he interested 
in the conduct of his pupils outside of his class-room? 
5. Does he cooperate with other teachers in respect to 
discipline? 

In general. 1. Does he (or she) visit pupils in their 
homes? 2. Does he attend the meetings of the parents' 

290 



THE TEACHER'S OWN LIFE 

association or other similar society? 3. Is he an agree- 
able and helpful colleague? 4. Is he loyal to his su- 
periors in educational office? 5. Does he interest him- 
self in the general welfare of his school and of the cause 
of education in the community? 6. Is his health ade- 
quate for the regular performance of his duties? 7. Has 
he travelled widely? 8. Has he a pleasant voice? 
9. Does he question well? 10. Is he self-controlled? 
11. Is he willing to accept suggestions? 12. Has he the 
ability to carry out suggestions? 13. Does he see what 
is going on about him (a) in his class-room? (b) else- 
where? 14. Has he made a scientific study of human 
nature in children and youth? 15. Has he good exec- 
utive ability? 16. Do his pupils respect and admire 
him? 17. (a) Does he love children and youth; (b) or is 
he engaged in teaching from interest in the subjects that 
he teaches; (c) or does his interest seem temporary and 
primarily financial? 18. Does his record evince apti- 
tude and fitness for education? 19. Is he social or soli- 
tary (a) by nature? (b) by training and experience? 

Many other questions indeed are asked. Decisions 
for and against applications for licenses and for ap- 
pointments do indeed turn upon the answers to these 
other questions — e. g., height, weight, age, sex, religion, 
physical defects, prepossessing personal appearance, 
social standing, experiences of travel, higher education 
and culture, marriage, children, financial condition; but 
in nine cases out of ten, final success or failure as a teacher 
depends upon the progress of the pupils made in his care. 

The teacher who desires to do better work year after 

year may perhaps profitably consider these suggestions. 

Long ago, some clever man declared, "Beware of the 

man of one book." Select a few good books, perhaps 

20 291 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

but one or two a year, and faithfully master them. In 
our profession-to-be, there are as yet only a few great 
books. And even in the subjects taught in our second- 
ary and elementary schools, the literature as yet is not 
large. Read not many books but a few books much 
and well, — read half an hour every day, and two hours 
on Saturday. 

For the rest of one's scholarship, take one or two good 
educational periodicals such as really contain material 
at once useful and interesting in one's own line. 

Every teacher needs to read some poetry and some 
fiction for mental relaxation. It is not enough to get 
a book now and then from the public library. One 
needs a library, large or small, at one's hand at home. 
Of course, what the library contains should depend upon 
one's tastes as well as upon one's pocket-book. My 
own favorites are Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, Black- 
more's Lorna Doone, Scott's Ivanhoe, George Eliot's 
Middlemarch, Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, Dickens's 
Bleak House, Thackeray's Vanity Fair, Howells's 
A Boy's Town, Stevenson's Treasure Island, Kipling's 
Jungle Books, Cooper's Last of the Mohicans, Bulwer 
Lytton's Last Days of Pompeii for novels, — each of 
which I have read many times, — and for poetry Homer's 
Odyssey, Dante's Divina Commedia, and Shakespeare's 
and Lowell's poems generally. I read more poetry 
than prose-fiction. There is something rather conven- 
tional about the list, I know; but it suits my needs, 
which is the main requirement for any library. 

A teacher who would prosper must consider the mat- 
ter of health. Teaching five or six hours daily with 
duties before and after school with home-study and 
lesson-preparation is hard work, as the death-rate of 

292 



THE TEACHER'S OWN LIFE 

teachers shows. Here my suggestions again are simply 
presented, not urged — viz.: 

1. Upon coming home from school, wash and chill the 
back of one's neck and one's face with cold water and lie 
down to rest the spinal system. Take a nap if pos- 
sible. 

2. Take frequent baths, — sponge, shower, or tub, hot, 
warm, or cold, as best suits one's constitution and diathesis, 
— morning or night, — at least triweekly. 

3. Five nights in the week go to bed early. Physiolo- 
gists discriminate eighteen periodicities, — strength-fatigue 
rhythms. Don't expect to feel well at 11 a.m., at 4 p.m., 
or from 11 p.m. to 5 a.m. — the diurnal triple rhythm; or on 
Saturdays, the seven-days rhythm; or for one week in every 
twenty-nine days — the moon-month rhythm — whether man 
or woman, but especially woman; or in August and in 
April, the seasonal double rhythm; or if a man of English 
descent, when 22, 30, 39-40, 54-56 years of age; if a 
woman, at 19, 27, 36, 44-46 years of age. (Every human 
being should rest every seventh year, especially women 
school-teachers and all mothers.) 

4. Respect holidays and vacations as rest and recreation 
periods. 

5. Eat a good breakfast. Get up early and exercise 
enough to do this. When you have no appetite for break- 
fast, see your doctor. A good breakfast means hot oat- 
meal and a mutton chop, or the full equivalent. Vary the 
drinkables, and avoid strong, hot coffee daily: it ruins 
teaching. (The chief effect of coffee is to defy the daily 
triple rhythm.) 

6. Wear clothes just warm enough, — not too warm. 

7. At school, wear broad shoes, with broad low heels, and 
save the cervix of the neck. It is the price of a strong 
straight back ten years hence. 

293 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

8. Walk one hour daily in all weathers that permit 
walking, — in English fashion, from the hips down, not 
with ankle and calf only. 

9. And never worry. There is but one occasion when 
one may properly worry: after serious sin. Otherwise, 
never worry. For most of our "troubles," we are no more 
responsible than for the clouds and for the drouths. Worry 
otherwise is itself a sin. 



A teacher's vacation is a precious opportunity either 
for physical rest or for intellectual refreshment or for 
both. Unfortunately, there is often but little money 
left over for vacations, so that the summers must be 
spent less profitably than the teachers themselves wish. 
Many teachers take up some economic employment. 
Others remain at home. Still others search out the 
least expensive country or seaside or lake resorts, and 
there try to rest and to recuperate. What to do is 
always a personal problem. Some teachers cannot be 
spared from their homes. Others have no homes. So 
many accidents and other unforeseen events occur that 
an all-the-year economizing in order to have a good 
summer vacation often eventuates in disappointment. 
Travel is indeed good for most persons above twenty 
years of age. A railroad ticket is the best of geog- 
raphies. And yet some of the best trips I have ever 
made I never did make! — I "read up" about the 
region or country to be visited, but in the end I could 
not go. But so much as this is sure — that the boys 
and girls of my youth, now upon the foothills of age, 
who have done the best for the world and for them- 
selves are, in nearly all instances, those who have spent 
their holidays and vacations wisely. A few principles 

294 



THE TEACHER'S OWN LIFE 

may be ventured for those whose vacations are meas- 
urably within their control. 

1. Seek a change — of climate, of scenes, of faces, of the 
daily round. 

2. Get near to or into " Nature"; — the woods, the fields, 
the lakes, the sea, the mountains. 

3. Plan something to do — like photography, or building 
a boat, or painting pictures — to fill in when there is nothing 
else to do. 

4. Either have the right friends with you or proceed 
alone. 1 

5. Do not undertake too much. 

Here rises "the summer school question." It is a wise 
thing to go to a well-located summer school for part of the 
summer, — provided one does not pursue too many subjects 
daily. 

And here rises that other wonderful question, — the trip 
to Europe. "Yes, if well, and not too long a trip, covering 
too many places, is proposed." 

Often one who has had some experience in the world 
of education is asked by an entrant, — "Is it best to 
teach in high or elementary school or to seek a college 
position?" "Is it best to teach in a private, an en- 
dowed, a public or an ecclesiastical school?" These 
questions cannot be answered definitely, for two rea- 
sons. 1. We cannot foresee the change in American 

1 There is perhaps no one other reason so strong as to why some 
middle-aged persons do not improve as that they have been so un- 
fortunate as to link to themselves some one friend like themselves. 
With that friend, they spend their time in gossip, in regrets, in mut- 
ual admiration, becoming like vampires or leeches to one another. 
Have two friends, or three, or none. Even married couples who 
think nothing of others than themselves lose their power of growth. 

295 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

civilization for a lifetime. 2. Much depends upon the 
person, his or her qualifications, means, etc. It is a 
merely personal opinion, and offered only as such, that 
the public high school is to-day the most promising of 
all fields of educational labor. "Shall I teach at home 
or begin elsewhere?" To this, there is one general 
answer. " Begin elsewhere." 

In all these matters, remember that there are always 
at least five questions, — 1. Personal fitness for the work 
proposed. 2. The associations of one's life. 3. The 
amount of service to be rendered. 4. The salary. 
5. The cost of living. 

Teaching is an intensely practical affair. It makes 
men think, — makes teacher, pupils and the world think. 
Teaching makes thinkers. 1 In teaching, the teacher 
begets thinkers. And thinking sets the world forward 
in the way to truth. Thinking is intellectual life. 
Thinking is the soul of every virtue, the method of ar- 
riving at repentance for sin, the method of conversion, 
the path to salvation. The teacher must think. Unless 
he thinks, — which means to move, to observe, to re- 
flect, to understand, to judge, to reason, — he is not and 
cannot be a teacher in fact. The preservation (not to 
say the progress) of civilization depends upon teachers' 
really being thinkers and so raising up generation by 
generation other thinkers to take the place of those 
reaped in the ceaseless harvest of Death. 

For every civilization is the expression of ideas, the 
triumph of thought. Teaching is not parallel with or 
upon the same plane with the other learned professions. 
It is the good mother of them all. Teachers make 

1 "The most practical thing in the world is to make a man think." — ■ 
Thwing, History of Higher Education in America. 

296 



THE TEACHER'S OWN LIFE 

ministers, lawyers, physicians, surgeons, dentists, en- 
gineers, chemists, authors, journalists, poets, philoso- 
phers, professors, superintendents, inventors, mechanics, 
farmers, citizens. Only the illiterate manual laborers 
escape the teacher. Could teachers have their way 
with the young and keep them at school until educated 
morally, the entire supply of thieves, forgers, murderers, 
perjurers, maligners, prostitutes, gamblers, paupers, 
and all other enemies of mankind, would be automat- 
ically cut off. But are all educated men good? Yes. 
Some college graduates are criminals? No doubt; but 
pseudo-education is still a cult in some quarters. The 
true education leaves in the heart no willingness to 
wrong one's fellows even to preserve one's own life or 
that of near and dear ones. 

It is sometimes thought that the life of a teacher is 
narrow and circumscribed. Even harsher criticism of 
the teacher is sometimes indulged in by those who 
" speak evil of things they understand not." 1 

Teachers often suffer from being represented falsely to 
other adults by children and youth who, of course, can- 
not comprehend them. And these other adults some- 
times take the very praise of children and youth for their 
teachers as evidence that the teachers are of but child- 
ish natures. The very idealism of the teacher, the noble 
endeavor to preserve the good, the true and the beauti- 
ful in the world and in the esteem of the world is some- 
times made to appear as lack of common sense. But 
let us remember both that the nexus of our social life 
is precisely this brotherly kindness and charity that we 
teach and should exemplify and that the efficient mov- 
ing cause of progress in human history is the idealism, 

1 Peter, Second Epistle, ii: 12. 
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CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

the search for truth, the love of the good, the true, the 
beautiful for which we stand and forever must stand. 1 

In the main, teaching is a delightful service, in itself 
richly worth while, a privilege beyond any other privi- 
lege among men. Out of millions of homes, they send 
to us their young, their best, to teach them almost what 
we will. It is a sacred trust. They send these offspring 
of their own bodies, the dearest treasures of their souls, 
to us in a serene and sometimes thoughtless confidence. 
All the more should we do for them our best, which is 
our duty. 2 

And it is a pleasant thing to know that in the main 
the class teachers of America are cheerfully doing their 
full duty. 

1 "Behold, I have made thy face strong against their faces, — as an 
adamant harder than flint have I made thy forehead; fear them not, 
neither be dismayed at their looks, though they be a rebellious 
house." — Ezekiel, iii: 8-9. 

2 " Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things 
are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, 
whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; 
if there be any virtue and if there be any praise, think on these 
things." — Paul, Episte to the Philivvians, iv : 8. 



APPENDIX 



APPENDIX I 

AN OPEN LETTER TO ONE WHO IS JUST BEGINNING 
TO TEACH 

You are one of one hundred thousand new teachers here in 
America this year who are taking the places of those dropping 
out. The average experience of teachers is five years. You are 
one of five hundred thousand teachers now in our American 
schools and colleges. You will, therefore, probably teach five 
years. Of those who leave the work, one in every two marries. 
The other one is lost to teaching, sometimes because of being 
needed at home, sometimes because of going into other employ- 
ment, occasionally because of a legacy or other inheritance, often 
because of ill-health that never permits return; in some instances, 
Death calls. Of American women, one in one hundred is now 
teaching school and one in thirty has taught school. You belong 
to an army of intelligence, righteousness and good will. 

As a teacher, you are likely to be successful. Within a few 
years, you are likely to feel that the financial rewards of teaching 
are small, the labor hard, some of the conditions of teaching dis- 
agreeable, and that your own equipment is deficient. Nearly all 
teachers go through this awakening. It means that you will have 
discovered how important the work of teaching is. At present, 
you see it more as an enterprise for your own sake. Then you 
will see it in its true light of a social service, whose nature only 
experienced teachers and other enlightened persons really 
understand. 

In this book, I have tried to display something of the spirit, 
of the mechanism, and of the conditions of class teaching. It is 
a book primarily for young teachers. Youthful enthusiasm and 
zeal and health go far to supplement deficiencies of knowledge 

299 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

and of technical skill. Twenty years hence, you will be a good 
teacher only if in the mean time you have acquired knowledge 
and skill through labor and thought. 

Be patient with yourself. Be willing to go forward step by step. 

Do not expect much help from others: development is from 
within. 

Aim to be clear. It is perhaps the greatest beauty in true 
teaching. Nature avoids confusions and is discriminating, as 
Comenius showed in the world's first book of pedagogy, The 
Great Didactic. 

If you have official superiors who are professional educators, 
recognize the chief one of them as your captain. As Doctor 
Albert E. Winship says so eloquently in his famous lecture, "The 
Accompanist," it is the business of most of us to support cheer- 
fully and closely the soloist. Society is organized upon that 
fashion. 

If you have no professional educator to help you and to be 
helped by you and are solely responsible for your own work, 
cultivate the professional relations assiduously by reading good 
educational books and periodicals. 

When you grow tired and discouraged, or if disconcerted by 
some untoward event, perhaps beyond your control, or if you 
really do make mistakes, remember that all of us survivors from 
youthful days have also been discouraged and tired and dis- 
concerted and now count our mistakes not on our fingers' ends 
but in columns and relays of figures : you are experiencing life. 

And when in trouble do not hesitate to ask advice, though you 
may well hesitate about taking much of it. Advice helps one 
to get the other fellow's viewpoint, the world's opinion. More- 
over, when in trouble and in doubt, remember just a few stand- 
ards of conduct. 1. — If all other persons should act this way or 
that way, where would the world end? 2. — Courage and honor 
are the highest qualities, sometimes absolutely prescribed; but 
patience and tact may help tide along until there is better cosmic 
weather. 3. — Persons who are tired and sick should be wary 
about expressing themselves; they may be right, but others will 
not believe them. 

Finally, it is not the good resolution but the day's work that 
counts. 

300 



APPENDIX II 

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE EXPERIENCED 
CLASS TEACHER 

The secret of progress is forward change; of power, is truth- 
seeing. 

The optimist tales off his incomes, the pessimist his expenses; 
but the philosophical veteran counts assets and debits, re- 
ceipts and outgoes, and strikes the balance truthfully. 

Middle-life and old age have their advantages: " We have seen 
something like this before." Routine has lost its irksomeness 
and has given us habit, familiarity, facility and skill. And we 
do know something about people, not very much, not too much, 
not enough indeed, but something; we are not so often surprised. 

Blessed are they who at fifty years of age have still kept their 
visions. In a hundred years, we have created a whole generation 
of old persons, raising the average term of life a dozen years. 
The center of social gravity has been lifted from the man forty 
years of age to the man of fifty-five. 1 The dead-line of old age 
used to be at forty years: it is now at sixty, as our teachers' 
pension laws show. We have done also many other wonderful 
things in the past hundred years, — we have found that women 
are just as useful to culture and civilization as men and thereby 
have doubled the workers for the social good; we have learned 
to reform criminals, not simply to jail or kill them; we have dis- 
covered the nature of the feeble-minded, have thereby learned 
much about the nature of the normal, and have come to love all 

1 The average age of the signers of the Declaration of Independence 
in 1776 was thirty-seven years: that of our present Congress is 
fifty-six years. 

301 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

human beings, even the unfortunate; we have discovered also 
the values of the young and for the first time in human history- 
are freely teaching to all children the ways of culture; we have 
made the stranger at home within our gates and thereby made 
passports relics of barbarism; we have created at last surplus 
wealth, enough for each, more than enough for all ; and we have 
made books and papers as universal as sunlight. And we call 
this the beginning, not more, the beginning of systematic, uni- 
versal civilization for humanity. There is much yet to do. 

We have yet to call up Lazarus from the foot of the table of 
Dives. Not all poverty is preventable. Such of it as is pre- 
ventable, — such as results from fraud and ignorance, — we 
should cease to ignore; and all the rest we should relieve. 
Perhaps ignoring poverty is the worst of the remaining vices 
of mankind. Education cannot much longer turn its face 
away from the fact that half of the "ignorance" of children 
is simply poverty at its second power — viz., physical and 
mental weakness and degeneracy. 

It is well for us who have seen half a century of this astonishing 
progress to cherish our friendships with those who have sur- 
vived with us from the depths of the Civil War and to cultivate 
new friendships with those who, taking our achievements as 
matters of fact, are now, with youthful energy, pushing on into 
the dawn. 

Even more important is it for us to woo new ideas. Wisdom 
will not die with us : nor has God shut the gateways of heaven 
so that new knowledge is not still flooding out into this world. 
The river of the water of life flows forever and is clear as crystal. 

Physicians tell us that "the body of a man is as old as his 
arteries." The mind of a man is as old as his ideas, his truths. 
The soul of the good man knows nothing of age, but forever wel- 
comes the new, and is young with faith and aspiration. 



APPENDIX III 
THE CHOICE OF TEXT-BOOKS 

1. There are now two hundred publishing houses that make 
text-books. Six of them are great national enterprises. 

2. Many of the new text-books are scientifically fresh and new, 
well printed in large clear type on good paper soft to the eyes, 
handsomely illustrated, written in good English, and substan- 
tially bound. 

3. The catalogues of any of these houses may be had for the 
asking. It is not necessary even to send stamps. The addresses 
of any of the large houses may be discovered in any educational 
periodical. They are all generous advertisers. 

4. And yet many teachers are still forced to use inferior books. 
The main reason is that teachers do not know the foregoing 
facts, and that others (often by law) choose their books for them. 

5. To be specific : There are now on the market to-day (a) four 
great systems of teaching to read, and twenty beautiful series of 
reading-books; (b) four fine geography series, two others almost 
as good, and one great series of travel geographies; (c) six 
notable arithmetics; (d) three series of Latin books and texts; 
(e) one wonderful series of supplementary reading and two others 
almost as good ; (/) one complete evening school series ; (g) three 
houses print libraries of German and French texts; (h) a revolu- 
tion is taking place in science teaching, from physiology to 
physics; (i) there is one great house devoted entirely to school 
drawing and (/) another to kindergarten materials; (k) there 
are three standard unabridged dictionaries; (I) four magnificent 
encyclopedias; and (m) one thirty- volume history of the United 
States, invaluable to any teacher. The smaller houses live by 
publishing notable books, and one or more of them may be a 

303 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

leader ten years hence, so keen is the effort to make yet better 
books and so eager are American educators to use them. 

In the above situation, the opportunity of district school 
teachers is their duty. Some day, State adoptions will be 
abandoned; and in cities and towns, class teachers will be asked 
to help select the best books. By 1920, unless the cosmic 
weather of the world sees some great war (which God forbid!), we 
shall be spending one billion dollars a year for education, and 
twenty-five, even thirty millions, for school-books. We doubled 
our annual school and college expenditures from 1900 to 1908; 
we shall double them again from 1910 to 1920. 

The good teacher asks for the best books; the poor teacher 
should have them. The best book is none too good for the child, 
or for any one else. 



APPENDIX IV 

OUTLINE OF A STANDARD MINIMUM COURSE OF 

STUDY BASED UPON THE COURSE IN THE 

SCHOOLS OF CINCINNATI, OHIO 

Dr. F. B. Dyer, Superintendent of Schools. 

Kindergarten. — Gifts. Occupation Work. Story-telling. Music. 

Games. 
Grade I. — English: Blackboard reading lessons. Primers and 
First Readers. Five hundred words. Phonics. Spell- 
ing. Stories. 

Number: 1-10. Counting to 100. Money coins. 

Nature: Familiar animals. Seeds. Weather. 

Writing: Pencil — large letters. Blackboard — arm move- 
ments. 

Music: Rote-songs, etc. 

Games. Calisthenics. Ethics. Busy Work. Hygiene. 

Drawing: Construction; color. 
Grade II. — English: Phonics. Second Readers. Spelling. Dic- 
tation. Oral reproduction. Stories. Memorizing. 
Dramatization. 

Arithmetic: Roman numerals to L. Clock. 11-50. Easy 
measurements. 

Nature: Some wild animals. Plants. Rain, snow, etc. 

Writing. Music. Games. Calisthenics. Hygiene. Ethics. 

Drawing: Construction; color, etc.; picture-study. 
Grade III. — Phonics. Third Readers. Spelling. Dictation. 
Plurals. Abbreviations. Adjectives. Statement, ques- 
tion, command. Composition. Dramatization. Local 
stories (of Cincinnati). Myths and legends. Memo- 
rizing. Correction of oral speech. 
305 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

Arithmetic: Multiplication tables, 2-5. Short division. 

Geography: Out-of-door observation. Land, water, life. 

Nature: Seasons Plants. Animals. Winds. 

Writing. Music Gam Calisthenics. Hygiene. Ethics. 

Drawing: Color, etc picture-stud}' . 
Grade IV. — English: Fourth Readers Spelling and dictation. 
Forms of Speech. Paragraphing Composition. Stories. 
Memorizing. 

Arithmetic: Multiplication tables, 6-12. Long division, 
two figures. 

Geography: The globe. North America. Mountain- 
systems. 

Nature: Stars, etc. 

Writing. Drawing. Music. Hygiene. Ethics. Calis- 
thenics. 
Grade V. — Fifth Readers. American history stories. Compo- 
sition. Spelling. Dictionary-study. Dictation. Letter- 
writing. 

Arithmetic: Denominate numbers. Easy common fractions. 

Geography: United States, Ohio. 

Nature. Ethics. Writing. Drawing. Music. Calis- 
thenics. Hygiene. 
Grade VI. — English: Sixth Readers. Spelling. Memorizing. 
Grammar. Composition. Dictation. Letter-writing. 
Themes correlated with other studies. 

Arithmetic: Denominate numbers. Decimals. United 
States money. 

Geography: Europe. 

Nature: Animals. Plants. Minerals. 

History: General, English, and United States. Stories 
of great men. 

Manual Training: Boys, shopwork. Girls, sewing. 

Drawing. Calisthenics. Hygiene. Music. Ethics. Writ- 
ing. 
Grade VII. — English: Seventh Readers. Spelling. Grammar. 
Composition. Memorizing. Social and business corre- 
spondence. Dictation. 

Arithmetic: Fractions. Denominate numbers. Percent- 
age and interest. 

306 



APPENDIX 

Geography: Asia. South America. Africa. Australia. 

Nature: Matter and heat by experiments. 

History: United States through Revolution. 

Manual Training: Boys, shopwork. Girls, sewing. 

Drawing. Calisthenics. Physiology. Music. Writing. 
Ethics. 
Grade VIII. — English: Eighth Readers. Snow-Bound, Sketch 
Book, Christmas Carol, Julius Cmsar, and other supple- 
mentary reading. Selections to be memorized. Spell- 
ing — Selected lists. Word-studies. Synonyms, affixes, 
meanings. Grammar — Syntax. Language and Com- 
position — Narration and description. Abstracts. Out- 
lines. Exercises in choice of words, variety of expres- 
sions, and figurative language. Social and business 
correspondence, — bills, notes, applications, etc. 

Mathematics: Ratio and Proportion. Evolution. Men- 
suration. Review. Algebra — Fundamental processes, 
equations, factoring. 

Geography: Physical causes. Commercial and industrial 
geography, taking the United States as a central point 
of view. 

Nature: Simple machines, light, sound, electricity, by ob- 
servation and experiment. 

History: From the American Revolution. Study of the 
Constitution. Local history and civics. 

Drawing: Freehand representation. Construction draw- 
ing. Design. Color. Picture-study. 

Penmanship. Ethics. Music. Hygiene and Physical 
Training. Physiology. Physical Exercise. 

Manual Training: Boys, shopwork. Girls, cooking. 
Special syllabus. 

21 



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APPENDIX V 
ILLUSTRATIVE LESSON PLANS AND EXAMINATION 

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL LESSONS 

1. Grade VIII. Arithmetic Review. (Deductive.) 

Time, 30 min. Topic : Six Per Cent. Interest, 

Presentation. Review, by question-and-answer, definitions of 
terms, — interest, principal, rate, amount. Inquire as to facts 
of legal interest rate and of prevailing rates. 

Generalization. Review development (on blackboard and 
orally). 

Years Int. upon $100 for 1 yr. = $6. upon $1. = $.06 

Int. upon $100 for 2 mo. = $1. upon $1. = $.01 

Months Int. upon $100 for 1 mo. = $ .5 upon $1. — $.005 

Days Int. upon $100 for 1 day = $ .0167 upon $1. = $.000167 
Incidental process. 1 yr. = 12 mo. £ yr. =2mo. 
^2 yr. = 1 mo. £ mo. = 6 days. 
1 yr. = 360 days. 1 mo. = 30 days. 1 day = ^ mo. = jfo year. 

Rule. To find interest upon a given principal at six per cent, 
for years, months and days : — Multiply the principal (a) by the 
prodnct of the number of years times $.06, for years ; (b) by 
the product of the number of months times $.005, for months; 
and (c) by the product of the number of days times $.000167, 
for days. The sum of (a), (6) and (c) is the interest. 

312 



APPENDIX 

Application. Find the interest upon $300 for 2 yr., 4 mo., 
12 days at six per cent. 

Yrs. 300 x 2 x $6. = $36. 

Mos. 300 x 4 x $ .005 = $ 6. 
Days 300 x 12 x $ .000167 = $ .60 



$42.60 

Answer, $42.60 

Drill. Examples in finding simple interest for years, months 
and days. 

2. Grade VIII. Grammar Advance. (Deductive.) 

Time, 30 min. Topic : The Infinitive To Be. 

Presentation. Review by question-and-answer definitions of 
transitive and intransitive verbs and of complements, and have 
principal parts of the verb "be" given. 

(a) To be prejudiced is to be weak. 

(b) He tried to be in his place promptly. 

(c) His ambition was to be first always. 

(d) The prisoner longed to be free. 

Bring out by questions that "to be " is a form of the verb "be " 
that may be used like a noun as the subject or complement, and 
like a verb may take a complement. 

Proceed in the same manner with (6), (c), and (d). 
These verb forms are all called "infinitives." 
Generalizations. 1. An infinitive may be used like a noun as: 
(a) The subject. 
(6) The object complement, 
(c) The attribute complement. 

2. An infinitive may be completed like a verb by: 

(a) An object complement. 

(b) An attribute complement. 

3. An infinitive may be modified like a verb by: 

(a) An adverb. 
(6) An adverbial phrase. 
Application. Have a set of sentences on the blackboard and 
direct pupils to select the infinitive, giving the use and modifica- 

313 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

tion of each. Let each child tell in what respect the infinitive 
is like a noun and in what it is like a verb. 

3. Grade VI. English. (Exercise.) 

Time, 15 minutes each day for a week. 
Review of a selection from The Man Without a Country, by 
Edward Everett Hale. 



1. Practical. To teach the children to know and use good 
English. By memorizing good English prose, it must become 
instilled in the mind and finally become a part of the vocabu- 
lary, — hence the need of review or repetition. 

2. Ethical. To teach and help to a love of family and to a 
love of country. 

Method. 

Exemplification. Children place upon desks selections from 
The Man Without a Country. The teacher reads the selection 
carefully and the pupils go through it once slowly and with 
expression, as taught. 

Interpretation. Questions are asked as to the meaning and 
explanations are given of certain parts, e. g. — "What had just 
taken place to which the words 'Let that show you,' refer?" 
Try to have children realize the intense feeling of Nolan in the 
part beginning, "And for your country, boy, and for that flag," 
etc. Ask — "Why are the words 'Through a thousand hells' 
used?" Here, "hell" means " place of death." Spend three 
or four minutes upon this rapid questioning for interpretation. 

Imitation. Several pupils read the selection. 

Memorizing (habituation). By reading and study and repe- 
tition, individuals and class gradually learn the selection. 
Finally, there is repeating of the passage in concert, with quiet 
voices, from memory. If certain parts have been forgotten, 
have children open papers and study for a few minutes. Then 
drill a little, orally, upon these parts. Frequently spend a few 
minutes upon individual recitation. 

Until learned, this is to be upon the blackboard: 

314 



APPENDIX 

"Youngster, let that show you what it is to be without a 
family, without a home, and without a country. And if you 
are ever tempted to say a word or to do a thing that shall put 
a bar between you and your family, your home, and your 
country, pray God in His mercy to take you that instant home 
to His own heaven. Stick by your family, boy, forget you have 
a self, while you do everything for them. Think of your home, 
boy; write and send and talk about it. Let it be nearer and 
nearer to your thought, the farther you have to travel from it; 
and rush back to it when you are free, as that poor black slave 
is doing now. And for your country, boy," and the words 
rattled in his throat, "and for that flag," and he pointed to the 
ship, "never dream a dream but of serving her as she bids you 
though the service carry you through a thousand hells. No 
matter what happens to you, no matter who flatters you or who 
abuses you, never look at another flag, never let a night pass but 
you pray God to bless that flag. Remember, boy, that behind 
all these men you have to do with, behind officers, and govern- 
ment, and people even, there is the Country Herself, your 
Country, and that you belong to Her as you belong to your own 
mother. Stand by Her, boy, as you would stand by your 
mother." 

4. Grade V. Geography Review. (Question-and-answer.) 

Time, 30 min. Topic : India. 

Purpose. 

1. General. To review the location of land and water areas, 
heat areas, water and ocean currents, food and mineral areas. 

2. Specific. To review position, size, form, surrounding 
waters, islands, surface, rivers, productions, commerce, inhab- 
itants, and cities of India. 

Commands 1. Calling: "Class ready for geography." 

2. Dismissal: " The lesson is over." 

Material. Large map of Asia. Production map of Asia. 
Papier-mache map of Asia. Maps of Asia (in books). Pointer. 
Post-cards. Pictures in geography books. Paper. Pencils. 
Crayon. 

315 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

The following topics on blackboard: 

Recitation. India. (Blackboard analysis.) 

Position — boundaries. Extent. Size. Form. 

Surrounding waters: Indian Ocean. Arabian Sea. Bay of 
Bengal. 

Islands: Ceylon. 

Surface: Plateaus — Deccan. Mountains — Himalaya. 

Rivers: Ganges. Indus. Brahmapootra. 

Climate. 

Productions'. 1. Agricultural: Grains. Fruits. Spices. Rice. 
Opium. 

2. Minerals — Diamonds. 

3. Manufactured — Calico. 
Commerce. 
Inhabitants. 
Government. 

Cities: Calcutta. Bombay. Madras. Delhi. Benares. 

5. Grade V. Drawing Advance. (Exercise.) 

Time, 30. min. Topic: The Black -Eyed Susan (color lesson). 

Purpose. 

1. To secure shape, size, and color values. 

2. To give to the child an impressive idea of complementary 
colors, as he sees them in Nature. 

3. To have the child study the way Nature has shaded the 
colors. 

Material, 

Drawing-paper, 6x9. Paints. Paint cloth. 
Method. 

Give to each of the children a flower. 

Explanation. Have them handle and study its parts: 

1. The shape, color, and shading of the petals. 

2. The shape, color, and shading of the stem. 

3. The shape, color, and position of leaves. 
Exemplification. The teacher paints a flower, keeping a little 

in advance of the pupils. 

Imitation. After the children have become very familiar with 

316 



APPENDIX 

the flower, let them begin with the center; then the petals, using 
the clear paint on the brush. 

From the blossoms let the pupils gradually work down the 
stem, putting in the leaves as they see them. 

The leaves and rays are hardly more than brush strokes, with 
here and there a little more color added, to secure darker tones 
or shadows. 

Repetition. A second attempt to paint this will be much more 
satisfactory than the first, especially in the mixing of the colors. 

Memorandum. Have children take great care in cleaning and 
thoroughly drying boxes. 

6. Grade IV. Physiology Advance. (Inductive.) 

Topic: The Teeth. 
Purpose. 

General. To teach the children facts that concern their health. 
Specific. To train the children to care for their teeth. 

Material. 

Chart. Diagram on board. 

Preparation. The teeth are really the first organs of diges- 
tion. Since they play so important a part, we should learn how 
to care well for them. 
Method. 

Experiment. Effect of acid upon lime. 

Presentation. Structure of tooth (from chart or diagram). 

I. White — shiny — smooth — hard (rougher under gum). 

II. Softer. 

III. Pulpy (nerves and blood-vessels). 

Tooth usually decays from outside inward. Hence, by keep- 
ing the outside clean, we can help to keep the teeth in good 
condition. 

How the enamel may be destroyed. 

Tooth is lime compound. 

Association. Food decomposes (candy). Acid forms. Re- 
sult (experiment). 

Generalization. Therefore, teeth should be cleaned after eat- 
ing anything. Hard toothpicks are bad for the gums. Nuts 

317 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

should be thoroughly shelled. Very hot and very cold drinks 
make trouble. Use pure water with soap or tooth-powder to 
clean teeth. 

Application. Decaying teeth not only cause the owner ill- 
health and suffering, but are also offensive to others. Remember 
that there are others in the world, and they would like to enjoy 
your wholesome appearance. 

7. Grade III. Reading Advance. (Exercise.) 
Time, 20 min. Topic : A Braye Boy. 
Material. 

Baldwin Third Reader. 
Purposes. 

(a) To get thought from the printed page. 
(6) To get new words. 

Exemplification. Phonic word preparation. 

Syllabicate and place on the board the following words, omit- 
ting all diacritical and accent marks. 

Imitation. Drill by class and individually with special atten- 
tion to th, wh; final t, d, n. 



Andy Moore 


thrown 


stout 


free kled 


rate 


rough 


bushy 


grate f ul 


e nough 


thought 


bro ken 


dan ger 


bea vers 


shan ty 


stretched 


en gine 


meant 


whis tied 


engi neer 


no tice 


purs es 


past 


mere 


col lege 


last 


puff ing 


dis tant 


dis ap pear 


plen ty 


dis tance 


hap pened 


stud ied 


class es 



Interpretation. Ask for meaning of difficult words, 
the following phrases : 

(a) " disappear in the distance." 
(&) " distant noise." 

(c) "passengers were grateful." 

(d) " took no notice." 

318 



Explain 



APPENDIX 

Erase the list before the actual reading lesson begins. 

Questions-and- Answers. Awaken the pupil's expectation. 

Study. Silent reading. Have pupils read *[ 1 ; then ask them 
with closed book to answer questions on the paragraph. 

Interpretation. Proceed through the lesson, paragraph by 
paragraph. 

Question-and- Answer. 1. Describe Andy Moore. 

2. Tell where his home was. What did he like to do? 

3. Describe the house. 

4. What could Andy see from his house? 

5. Did Andy wish to ride? 

6. What did he see one day? 

7. What caused the noise he heard? 

8. How did Andy try to stop the train? 

9. Tell how the engineer felt at first; later. 
10. How did the passengers reward Andy? 
Exemplification and Imitation. Study the following sen- 
tences for oral expression and have individuals read to the class. 

(a) " As for what people would say about it, what did he 

care?" 

(b) "Just then he heard a low, distant noise." 

(c) "Dear, dear! the cars were coming!" 

(d) "They would soon be there!" 

(e) "On, on came the cars." 

(/) "But Andy stood still and did not move an inch." 
(g) "The men said, 'God bless the brave boy!' " 
Habituation. Exercises to show an understanding and mas- 
tery of what has been attempted, including: 
Utilization. 1. Oral reading by pupils. 

2. Reproduction of the content of sections, and 

3. Free reproduction of the whole content, orally. 

8. Grade II. Reading. (Observation Drill Exercise.) 

Time, 20 min. Topic : Word Review. 

Presentation. Fifty words are printed in columns upon the 
board. Repeat in several columns words that are especially 
troublesome. 

Exemplification. Children, as called upon, pronounce the words, 

319 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

taking them in order without any pointing by the teacher. This 
requires each child to watch attentively. Call often upon the 
slower ones. 

Repetition. Change the method slightly the next time. The 
teacher points quickly to a word, and, after removing the pointer, 
asks a child to name the word indicated. This also requires 
close attention, and gives the teacher a good opportunity to 
clinch the words by pointing to a word many times and calling 
upon the ones who do not recognize it readily to name it. 

Testing. The teacher may then change her method again, 
and say, e. g., "Find 'beautiful' in the first column," etc. This 
adds interest and speed. Each child must look at each word in 
the column specified. By designating the column, we keep the 
children from looking, "hit or miss," all over the board. 

9. Grade I. Number. (Dramatization Exercise.) 

Time, 20 min. Topic: Nine. 
Aims. 

(a) General. To gain accuracy, facility, and rapidity, and to 
make process automatic. 

(b) Specify. To teach facts of the number 9: 5 -f- 4, 6-f 3, 
7 + 2, 8 + 1, and subtraction facts: 3 X 3, 9 -f- 3, % of 9. 

Basis of Lesson. Children's knowledge of (1) facts through 
the number eight previously taught and drilled upon, (2) terms 
used, as "add," "take away," "how many," "times," (3) usual 
method of instruction. 
Material. 

Bundle of ten toothpicks; pile of ten gun- wads for each child; 
chart of facts through nine ; blackboard and crayon. 

Exemplification and Imitation. Senses appealed to : (1) touch, 
(2) sight, (3) hearing. 

(a) Touch and sight, Children use (1) gun- wads to make 

pictures as teacher directs, (2) break toothpicks 
to get £ of 9, (3) crayon or pencil to draw same, 
and then to express it, using figures. 

(b) Sight and hearing. Chart drill. 

Habituation. Seat work. (1) Domino cards. (2) Other 
cards, etc. 

320 



APPENDIX 

10. Grade VIII. United States History. (Written Test.) 

Time, 50 min. Topic: One-half year's work,— 1800-1865. 

1. In each case, give two or more reasons why each of the follow- 

ing men is famous, — (a) Thomas Jefferson; (b) Zachary 
Taylor. 

2. (a) What were two causes of the War of 1812? (b) What 

victory was won in the war by Andrew Jackson? 

3. What were the circumstances that led to the annexation of 

Texas? 

4. (a) What was the Dred Scott case? (6) What was its effect 

upon public sentiment in the North? 

5. Explain the meaning of the term " State's Rights." 

6. Draw a sketch-map of the United States, and upon it locate 

(a) Bull Run, (b) Pittsburgh Landing, (c) Hampton 
Roads, (d) New Orleans, (e) Gettysburg, (/) Vicksburg, 
(g) Chancellorsville, (h) Atlanta, (i) Richmond, (/) Wash- 
ington. 

7. Why did President Lincoln issue the Emancipation Procla- 

mation? 

8. Tell about any two important inventions in this period. 

9. Name one important author in this period, and at least one 

of his productions. 
10. (a) What is the Congress of the United States? (b) Tell 
how the members are chosen. 



APPENDIX VI 
ILLUSTRATIVE TEACHERS' EXAMINATIONS 

I. ELEMENTARY TEACHERS' EXAMINATIONS 

Ohio uniform teachers' examination questions for county 
teachers' examination for the Elementary School Certificate, 
prepared under the direction of the State School Commissioner 
and sent out from his office in accordance with Section 7819 of 
the General Code, for August, 1910. 

1. ARITHMETIC 

1. A pole 72 feet long was broken off so that f of the shorter 

piece was 4f of the longer piece. What was the length of 
each piece? 

2. Name the elements of the circle and give the values of each 

term in the terms of the other dimensions given. 

3. A rectangle whose diagonal is 40 feet contains 3| acres; what 

is the diagonal of one that contains four times as much? 
What are the dimensions of the latter rectangle? 
4-5. Solve and explain as to a class of beginners: A dealer 
bought a drove of cattle for $1800. He sold them at 
public sale, taking 90-day notes drawing interest at 6% for 
$2180. He discounted the notes in bank at 8%. What 
per cent, did he gain on the transaction? 

6. I sold a farm of 160 acres at $75 per acre, which annually 

yielded an income of $6 per acre, and invested the proceeds 
in 8% stock at 80, including the brokerage. What was 
the change in my income? 

7. It is eighteen minutes until 12 o'clock; when will the minute 

hand overtake the hour hand? How far did it travel? 
322 



APPENDIX 

8. If the gravel for a street £ of a mile long cost $4200 for depth 
of 9 inches deep, the width of the street being 50 feet, 
what would be the cost of macadamizing a street 1£ miles 
long, 60 feet wide at a depth of 8 inches if the stone cost 
80% more than the gravel? 

2. PHYSIOLOGY 

1. What are the chief offices of the tongue? Of the eustachian 

tube? Of the spleen? 

2. Define mind-study; intellect; sensibility. How are these 

affected by the environment? 

3. What is malaria? What are its causes? Its prevention? 

4. Describe two distinct kinds of poisoning. Give the antidotes 

for each. 

5. Describe in detail the inner ear. 

6. In what way do the physical defects of children operate upon 

their morals? 

7. Define the different processes of digestion. What are the 

effects of narcotics and alcoholics upon each of these 
processes? 

8. Give all the uses of the saliva. Of the different divisions of 

the nervous system. 

3. GRAMMAR 

1. What is grammar? A grammar? What is historical 

grammar? A language? Etymology? 

2. Give the past tense and past participle of do, set, fly, strew, 

and weave. 

3. Write the singular and plural possessive of deer, apple, ox, 

Mary, German, ally, chief, buffalo, man-of-war, goose- 
quill. 

4. What is an adjective clause? Show one in a sentence. 

Abridge this sentence. Parse each word in the abridged 
sentence. 

5. Write a paragraph of not less than ten lines on the topic 

"The Material Benefits of the Study of Language and 
Composition." 
22 323 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

6. What is a phrase? Classify phrases and give examples of 

each in sentences. 

7. Distinguish between finite and infinite verbs; between 

regular and irregular verbs; between deponent and re- 
flexive verbs. Give examples. 

8. Diagram and parse the italicized words: 

"So thick a haze o'erspreads the sky, 
They cannot see the sun on high; 
The wind hath blown a gale all day; 
At evening it hath died away." 

4. GEOGRAPHY 

1. Name the great religions of the world. In what countries 

do they exist ? Who are the leading races of people that 
worship these religions? 

2. Account for the location and growth of Cincinnati. Of 

Toledo. Of Melbourne. 

3. What are the principal resources of the Rhine valley? Of 

the Valley of the Ganges? Of the countries west of the 
Andes Mountains? 

4. Give the latitude of England and of Tasmania. Which is 

colder? Why? 

5. Name some country famous for the production of diamonds; 

of quinine; of salt; of hemp; of zinc. 

6. Compare Oregon and Tennessee in area, population, minerals, 

and natural resources. 

7. Where are the following places and for what noted: Plains 

of Abraham? Barcelona? The Soo? Trinidad? Mecca? 

8. What can you tell about the disputed boundary-line between 

the United States and Mexico? About the proposed ad- 
mission of two more States to our Union? 

9. Name some coal-producing counties in Ohio. The tobacco 

counties. The wine-producing counties. The oil coun- 
ties. The largest and the smallest county in Ohio. 
10. Describe the eastern coast of Asia. Locate the leading 
cities, capes, islands, and ports of entry. 

Examinations were given also in Theory and Practice of 

324 



APPENDIX 

Teaching, in United States History, in Reading, in Literature, in 
Orthography, and in Writing. 

II. ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMINATIONS FOR HIGH 
SCHOOL CERTIFICATE 

1. GERMAN 

1. Translate: 

Indessen verursachten die Erziehung seiner Tochter und 
das Leben in der Stadt erhohte Ausgaben. Ein Defizit 
von fast zwei tausend Thalern war die Folge. Da uberre- 
dete Ehrentahl den Baron, ihm zehntausend Thaler Vor- 
schuss zu geben, um ihm zu beweisen, wie leieht es auch 
fur einen Edelmann sei, mit barem Gelde ein schnelles und 
vortheilhaftes Geschaft zu machen. Mit den zehntausend 
Thalern wurde ein Vorrath Holz von einem betriigerischen 
— dem Freiherrn unbekannten — Holzhandler gekauft, der, 
wie Ehrenthal behauptete, grade jetzt das Geld brauchte 
und nicht auf eine gunstigere Zeit warten konnte, um das 
Holz zu seinem Werthe zu verkaufen. Der Freiherr 
glaubte dieser Darstellung; und Wochen spater teilte er 
mit Ehrenthal den Gewinn von viertausend Thalern. 
Das Defizit des Barons war gedeckt ; und Ehrenthals ver- 
hangnissvoller Einfluss auf den Edelmann war gesichert. 

2. To what declension of nouns do the italicized words belong? 

3. Give the principal parts of the following: 

Der Mensch, der Schimmel, dieser lange Wald, eine 
breite Wiese, dieser grosse Bar. 

4. Decline the demonstrative in the sg. and plu. of der die das. 

(a) Give the interrogative pronouns wer and was. 
(6) Decline the personal pronouns sg. and plu. 

5. Conjugate in sg. and plu., all tenses, subjunctive mode, the 

verb ich werde gejagt. 

6. Write the principal parts of these verbs: schreiben, biegen, 

nehmen, schelten, treffen, werfen, verschwinden, beenden, 
gebieten, uberfallen, entlaufen, erschlagen. 

7. Translate into German: 

He is a genuine friend of the workingmen, but he always 
325 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

acts in his own interest, which he hopes to increase in time 
to come. You are not safe in Uri; for the tyrants lend a 
hand to one another. As she entered the room I noticed 
that she had been weeping. I endeavored to console her. 
She would not be consoled, but cried more than ever for 
the child that had been taken from her by God. 

2. PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

1. How do you account for the soil of Ohio? For the different 

rocks of Ohio ? For the waters of Ohio ? 

2. Give location of the cotton and wheat belts of the United 

States. Of the coal regions of the world. Account for 
these. 

3. What is meant by high and low barometer? In what direc- 

tion do the winds blow in reference to these? What 
special uses for the barometer? 

4. Explain moraines and the different kinds of moraines, and 

tell how we may know them. 

5. Give three sources of the deposits of the sea. What are some 

of the effects of these deposits ? 

6. Explain the formation of lakes. Write about the Great 

Lakes as to size, formation, effects upon the climate and 
the people, their location, etc. 

7. Where in the schools should the teaching of physical geog- 

raphy be begun? Why so? How? 

8. Describe the physiography of the coasts of Africa. 

9. Make a list of the world's great lowlands and give the climates 

and productions of each. 
10. State the origin and form of sand-reefs. 

3. PHYSICS 

1. Describe and give the principles of the speaking-tube. Give 

an experiment to show that sound-waves are not trans- 
mitted in a vacuum. 

2. What is a gas? Give a law for the expansion of 

What apparent exceptions to the law? 
326 



APPENDIX 

3. Give three different ways in which a body may be charged 

with electricity. How may we know that a body is 
charged with electricity? Give some of the effects of a 
body being electrically charged. 

4. Make drawings showing the experiments necessary to ex- 

plain the pendulum and its uses. Write your deductions 
from these experiments. 

5. A belt runs from a fly-wheel to pulley. The pulley is 16 

inches in diameter and makes 1800 revolutions per min- 
ute while the fly-wheel rotates 150 times per minute. 
What is the diameter of the fly-wheel? 

6. How can you tell the pole of a helix? How tell the direction 

of the current ? 

7. Write the rules of capillary attraction. Illustrate with ex- 

periments that you would use in a class. 

8. What is refraction of light? Write the laws for refraction. 

Give the results of the refraction of light and the uses of it. 

4. CHEMISTRY 

1. Give two methods of preparing oxygen; write equations. 

2. What is an acid? A base? A salt? Name two of each, 

giving chemical formula in each instance. 

3. State and explain Boyle's law. 

4. Calculate the weight of sodium chloride necessary to produce 

25 grams of hydrochloric acid. 

5. Give one method of preparing chlorine; write equations. 

6. Explain the structure and the principle of the miner's safety- 

lamp. 

7. Explain one process for extracting iron from its ore. 

8. State briefly the chemistry of ordinary combustion. 

9. What are the following and how produced: KC10 3 ? MnCl 2 ? 

Cu(N0 3 ) 2 ? 
10. Name the parts of a flame. Give the chemistry of the flame. 

5. GEOMETRY 

1. Define axiom, postulate, corollary frustum of a cone, and 

spherical triangle. 

2. Prove: All radii of sphere are equal. 

327 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

3. Prove: If the two chords of circle are perpendicular to each 

other, the sum of the four circles described on the four 
segments as diameters is equivalent to the given circle. 

4. Construct an angle of 18°; an angle of 120°. 

5. Prove : Two altitudes of a triangle are inversely proportional 

to the corresponding bases. 

6. Find the locus of points equidistant from the three edges of 

a trihedral angle. 

7. Prove: The areas of two triangles which have an angle of 

the one supplementary to an angle of the other are to 
each other as the products of the sides including the 
supplementary angles. 

8. Construct a triangle, given its base, the ratio of the other 

sides, and the angle included by them. 

6. CIVIL GOVERNMENT 

1. Give the composition of the Supreme Court of the United 

States at this date. What is the salary of its members? 
When and how can its members retire? 

2. What can you say of the effects upon our civic affairs of a 

political campaign? Of what value are political cam- 
paigns? 

3. What were some of the laws passed by Congress at its recent 

session? Describe one. 

4. Who is a foreigner? How may he become an American 

citizen? 

5. Describe our bankruptcy laws. 

6. Write about some of the efforts in America to form a union 

during colonial times. 

7. Define jurisdiction, appellate jurisdiction, original jurisdic- 

tion, right of appeal, and habeas corpus proceedings. 

8. Describe fully how the Constitution may be amended. Give 

the aims of the last three amendments adopted. 
9-10. Write a short description of the organization and manner 
of work of our State Legislature. 

Examinations were given also in Latin, Algebra, Botany, 
Rhetoric, Literature, Physiology, General History, and Theory 
and Practice of Teaching. 

328 



APPENDIX VII 
RULES AND REGULATIONS FOR A DISTRICT SCHOOL 

Suggestions 

I. Have as few rules and regulations as possible. 

II. Talk about them but little. 

III. Read them at the beginning of the year to the class. 

IV. Keep them on file (in print or in writing) for reference in 

case of need. 
V. Never make a rule after the event and then punish an 

offender. 
VI. Make only such rules and regulations as are needed to cover 

cases likely to arise. 
VII. In actual practise, it may be necessary to make some 
special rules for boys and others for girls, and some for 
the older pupils and others for the younger. 

Rules 

1. The hours of the school-day are: 

School begins a.m. 

Recess at to a.m. 

Morning session ends 

Afternoon session begins p.m. 

Recess at to p.m. 

School closes 

2. Pupils are to be in their seats when school begins. 

3. Pupils may leave school only with the teacher's permission. 

4. Pupils absent or tardy are to bring a written excuse from 

home. 

329 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 

5. Pupils whose tardiness or absence is unexcused may be re- 

quired to make up the lost time after school. 

6. Pupils may be detained after school not exceeding 

minutes. 

7. There must be no fighting on the school grounds or near 

them. 

8. Profane and vulgar language is forbidden. 

9. All damage to school property must be paid for. All wilful 

damage must be paid for, and a fine paid in addition. 

10. Pupils may speak quietly to other pupils when necessary, 

but there must be no whispering or note-writing. 

11. Pupils must not use tobacco. [A diploma of graduation 

will not be granted to any user of tobacco in this school.] 

12. Politeness, kindness, and common sense are the orders of the 

day here. 



APPENDIX VIII 

SUGGESTED ENGLISH EXERCISES IN CORRELATION 

WITH OTHER SUBJECTS FOR BOTH URBAN 

AND RURAL SCHOOLS 

1. Government. Debate. — Resolved, That it is better to be a 

policeman than a fireman. Also, postman versus school 
principal. Such debates may precede composition- 
writing on these themes. 

2. Industry. Debate. — Resolved, That a carpenter should have 

the same wages as a brick-mason. Debate. — Resolved, 
That the farmer has a happier life than the grocer. 

3. History, any Grades. Discuss in contrast any pairs of great 

men and women. See page 255, above, for suggestions 
as to portfolios of material. 

4. Geography. Debate. — Resolved, That India is a better 

country to live in than China. Debate. — Resolved, That 
the United States should annex Canada. 

5. Social Life. Debate. — Resolved, That the doctor is a more 

useful citizen than any other kind of man. Debate. — 

Resolved, That everybody before graduation should be 

taught some trade at school. 

There are many ways to secure the interest of the boy and 

girl, but whether in High School or in Second Grades there is 

no better way than daily by practical themes of conversation 

and of composition to let him and her see for themselves that 

school is a part of real life, dealing with real things and with 

real persons. 

331 



INDEX 



Accrediting schools, n. 61. 

Administration, denned, 147; its 
value, 157; its measures, 159. 

Adolescence, cross-heredity at, 
30, 108; secondary, 30; and 
handwriting, 225. 

Adults, success in life, 15; their 
place in the child's world, 29; 
find it difficult to understand 
children, 93; obedient to prin- 
ciples, 112; their virtues not 
to be anticipated by children, 
193; dispositions toward life, 
285; and teachers, 297. 

Advance lessons, 138. 

Ages, psychical and physical 
compared, 31; racial, 218, et 
seq. 

Agriculture, 264, et seq. 

Algebra, its locus, 227. 

Altriciousness, 219-220. 

Analytic method, n. 52. 

Ancestry, 99; as a force in the 
growing life, 107. 

Animals, as viewed by children, 
94. 

Apperception, defined, 22; masses, 
280. 

Application, as a step in the in- 
ductive lesson, 42; the deduc- 
tive, 44. 

Aristotle, his Politics quoted, n. 
89; 190; 195-196; his "golden 
mean "illustrated, 170. 

Arithmetic, illustrative lessons, 
43, 312-313, 320; as an hier- 
archy of topics, 105; its practi- 
cal value in the solvency of the 



individual, 111; its locus, 226- 
227; in first grade, 229; file of 
papers in, 251; and community 
prices, 256; teachers' examina- 
tion in, 321. 

Arrest of development, cause of 
evil, 251. 

Art, its nature, 26; and Nature, 
233. 

Artist, and devices, 35; and 
money, 89. 

Ascham, Rogers, his School- 
master quoted, n. 81. 

Association, the third step in the 
induction recitation, 41. 

Association of ideas, its value, 22; 
from known to unknown, 39; 
power as formula to acquire 
need, 55, 167. 

Attainments, not sole factors in 
grading, 209. 

Attention, three kinds of, 238. 

Averages of marks, 203-204. 

Authority of the teacher, 160. 

Ay res, Leonard P., his Open Air 
Schools cited, 251. 

Bibliography of knowledge re- 
quisite in teaching, comment, 
n. 100. 

Biology, and reviews, 81; and the 
child, 99; key to physiology, 
106; and education, 233. 

Blackboards, 178, 239. 

Board of education, 134; 286- 
287. 

Bookish schooling, 36; teaching, 
78. 



333 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



Bookishness, not characteristic of 
elementary teachers, 103. 

Bookkeeping, 275. 

Books, their true use, 40; directed 
study of, 72; of reference, 252. 

Boys, bad, 174. See Pupils also. 

Breaking the colt, 168. 

Brotherhood of man, an idea not 
yet fully understood, 8. 

Brown, Elmer E., his Making of 
Our Middle Schools quoted, 
143. 

Bryant, William Cullen, his For- 
est Hymn quoted, 125. 

Calisthenics, 124. 

Carpentry, as a psychological ex- 
ercise, 11; key to mechanic 
arts, 272. 

Categories of human thought, 
106. 

Cause and effect in history, 105. 

Character, how attained, 22. 

Chemistry, teachers' examination 
in, 327. 

Child, and view of the world, 93; 
as reader of character, 139; 
opinion of teacher by, 167. 
See Pupils also. 

Chronology in history, 105. 

Church and State, 111. 

Cicero, his De Orator e quoted, 39. 

Citizenship, when good, 114. 

City school system, 120, 199, 
269; metropolitan, 260. 

City versus country, 86, 185, 274. 

Civil government, teachers' ex- 
amination in, 328. 

Civilization, requires the school, 
65; always springs from ideas, 
116; and education, 256, 296; 
denned, n. 263. 

Class, what division to aim to 
teach, 32; in district school, 
130; results in, vary from year 
to year, 139; control, 145; 
number of pupils in, 200; pub- 
lic, 217; its order, 238; and 
teacher, 244. 



Classification, 199, et seq.; in 
high school, 202. 

Class-room, its ventilation, 248; 
its equipment, 252. 

College teaching, 81, 128. 

Comenius, his Great Didactic 
quoted, 151, 233. 

Commercial high schools, 200, et 
seq. 

Common school as a benign force 
according to Horace Mann, 65. 

Compulsory education, the disci- 
pline problem, 167; dropping 
out of school at end of term of, 
207. 

Concentration, necessary in learn- 
ing, 21. 

Conscience, of children, 94; of 
teacher, 97. 

Consciousness, states of, made by 
the educator, 146. 

Consolidated school, 82. 

Content studies, 136. See Stud- 
ies also. 

Controversies over schools, 95. 

Cookery as a science, 279. 

Corporal punishment, 95; as a 
theory of discipline, 146; for- 
bidden in France, 146; in New 
York City and in New Jersey, 
157; practised in Germany, 146; 
rules as to its infliction, 163- 
164. 

Correlation in teaching, 76; of 
history and geography, 106; 
in language, 256. 

Country versus city, 85, 185, 274. 

Courage as a virtue, 177, 193. 

Course of study, classified into 
studies and exercises, 6, 52; 
overcrowded, 42; methods of 
various subjects, 79; interpret- 
ed by teacher, 93; its spiritual 
nature, 116; schema, 206; 
values of various subjects, n. 
209; its simplification, 228; 
how to avoid overcrowding, 
230; in Cincinnati, 305-311. 

Cripples, 188. 



334 



INDEX 



Culture, its relative importance 

in the university, 67; homes of, 

181. 
Culture epochs theory, 109; and 

school discipline, 192-195. 
Curiosity, its value, 91. 
Curriculum, analyzed, 89-90. See 

Course of Study. 

Daily program, in the district 
school, 84, 132-133; how made, 
122-124. 

Daily work, and marks, 88, 203; 
and record, 119; tells the story, 
137. 

Deductive recitation, 43; and out- 
of-class study, 71. 

Defective and deficient pupils, 
180, et seq.; n. 263. 

Democracy, 115, 190; basis of pu- 
pil self-government theory, 154. 

Demotion, 212; time for, 217-218. 

Department organization, ad- 
vantages and disadvantages, 
72, et seq.; in grammar grades, 
81, 88. See High schools. 

Department teaching, in high 
schools, 70; time of students 
apportioned, 72. 

Device, defined, 35, 255. 

Dialectic, of growth, 195; of his- 
tory, idealists versus material- 
ists, 116; of life, according to 
Jesus, 170. 

Diary of school-teacher, 132. 

Discipline, defined, 20; four theo- 
ries^ 148; practices, 154; re- 
porting cases of, to higher 
officers, 213. 

Disorder, when trivial, 180; and 
transfer of pupil, 246. 

District school, difficulty of grad- 
ing, 76; its importance in 
America, 82-83; its daily work, 
130; in Maryland, n. 200; with 
several teachers, 201; and ur- 
ban, compared, 287. 

Domestic science and art, 278, et 
seq. 



Drainage and population, 271. 

Dramatized lesson, 17, 255-256, 
320. 

Drawing, as an exercise, 10; psy- 
chological in its nature, 53; 
special teacher for, 74; by class 
teacher, 240; illustrative les- 
son, 316-317. 

Drill, its uses, 12; in the deduc- 
tive lesson, 44; in postchild- 
hood, 86; in logical studies, 134. 

Duty, of pupil to study, 72; the 
center of morality, 112. 

Ear-mindedness, 48, 189; its 
training, 254. 

Educability, its limits, 108. 

Education, as an art, 23; its pur- 
pose in the university, 28; 
against resistance, 104; a moral 
issue, 108; order of, its nature, 
117; the teacher promotor of, 
137; defined, 83, 145; moral 
aims of, 169; a relation of su- 
perior and inferior, 211; and 
Nature, 233; motives of, 280; 
as an opportunity, 285. 

Education system, 286-287. 

Educational ■ precipice, 207; n. 
223. 

Educational process, the, its 
stages, 14, 22; based on learn- 
ing, 20; as a continuum, 73; 
as socium, 73; irreversibly for- 
ward, 104; not regimentation, 
134; and age, 222; and de- 
velopment, 229; requires time, 
239, 257. 

Efficiency as an educational 
ideal, 17. 

Eliot, Charles W., his More 
Money for the Public Schools 
cited, 264. 

Energy, surplus nervous, re- 
quisite to education, IS. 

English, illustrative lesson, 314- 
315. See Good English. 

Entrance examinations, n. 61; to 
high school, 87. ' 



335 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



Environment, and heredity, 98; 
the struggle with, 107; its 
items, 108. 

Examinations, place in school, 
58; purpose, 59; use, 63; in 
elementary schools, tests of 
teachers, not pupils, 63, 88; 
frequency, 86; professional li- 
censes, 215; examples of, 321- 
328. 

Exemplification as a stage in 
teaching an exercise, 54. 

Exercise, when understood, 9, 
n. 281 ; as a test of real knowl- 
edge, 10; psychological, 53; its 
method, 62; illustrative lessons, 
314—320 

Exhibition days, 132, 255, n. 232. 

Expressive activities, n. 280. 

Eye-mindedness, its advantages, 
49. 

Eyesight, its defects, 183-184; 
and lighting of school-room, 
249; its training, 254. 

Faculties of mind, misunder- 
stood, 111. 

Fatigue, its limits, 57; in exami- 
nations, 60; in recitations, 122- 
123. 

Feeble-minded, 188; tests, 189. 

Femininity, of teaching, 103. 

Fenelon, his Education of Girls 
quoted, 91. 

Fire-drill, 178. 

Five formal steps of recitation 
stated and delimited, 37; ex- 
plained, 38. 

Food-supply and population, 271. 

Foreign language teaching, 63, 
71, 202. 

Foreigners in public schools, 28- 
29; and learning to read, 79; as 
advocates of backward social 
movements, 110; and school 
discipline, 157; segregation of, 
at school, not desirable, 201; 
and ages, 219-220. 

Forms, in district school, 132-133. 



France, theory and practice of 
discipline, 155. 

Freedom, its nature, 108; of the 
child at school, 176. 

Fresh knowledge essential, 78; 
commanded by teaching office, 
100; and daily preparation, 121 

Froebel, his Education of Man 
quoted, opp. copyright; 152; 
cited, 226; his Education by 
Development quoted, 257. 

Functioning, as a test of pro- 
ficiency, 11; as part of process 
of education, 111. 

Gardening, key to agriculture, 
266, et seq. 

General method, of the recitation, 
34; in the district school, 85. 

Generalization, in the inductive 
recitation, 41 ; in the deductive, 
43. 

Genetic process, stated, 22; util- 
ized by the teacher, 80. 

Genius, 109. 

Geography, its laws, 226; illus- 
trative lesson, 315-316; teach- 
ers' examination in, 324. 

Geology, 128. 

Geometry, its locus, 226; teach- 
ers' examination in, 327. 

German, teachers' examination 
in, 325. 

Germany, theory and practice of 
discipline in, 155. 

Girls, care of health of, 223. 

Golden mean, 170. 

Good English, its necessity for 
the teacher, 78, 96, 243. 

Government, always operated by 
individuals, 190. 

Grade programs, 124, 126. 

Grade teaching, why necessary, 
74; its advantages, 76. 

Grading pupils, 76; in the dis- 
trict school, 83; the several 
factors, 205. 

Grammar, illustrative lesson, 313; 
teachers' examination in, 323. 



336 



INDEX 



Grammar school organization, 

73, et seg. 
Group teaching, 230-231. 
Growth and education, 230. 

Habit, of learning, 20; in social 
life, 109. 

Habituation, in postchildhood, 
86. 

Hancock, John, cited, 227. 

Handwriting, at certain ages, 86; 
itslocus, 225. 

Harris, Ada V. S., her expressive 
activities cited, n. 281. 

Harris, William T., cited, n. 208. 

Health and age, 219. 

Hearing, its defects, 185. 

Hegel, on Nature, n. 107; his 
Philosophy of Right cited, 161. 

Heredity, and education, 19-20; 
239; and ear-mindedness, 48; 
and environment, 98; and 
handwriting, 225. See Adoles- 
cence. 

Heuristic recitation, 45; two uses 
of, n. 45. 

Hierarchical organization of 
school, 89; of studies for mark- 
ing purposes, n. 209. 

High school teaching, 67; de- 
partmental organization, 69; 
entrance examinations, 87; seg- 
regation of sexes in, 200; 
length of course, n. 223. 

High schools, for mechanic arts, 
201, 264; for commerce, 201, 
compared, n. 202. 

History, too hard for small chil- 
dren, 7; varied by its method, 
16; inductive lesson plan, 40; 
reviews in, 87; and differentia- 
tion of the social institutions, 
111; and teaching patriotism, 
114; its dialectic of progress, 
116; and pupil self-govern- 
ment, 191; locus of, 224; test, 
321. 

Home and school, 74; as seen by 
pupil, 93; in theory of disci- 



pline, 149; 182; and retarda- 
tion, 210. 

Home-nursing, 279-280. 

Home-study, the problem, 50; 
amount of, 71. 

Honor as an ideal, 113. 

Human nature, how to read, 103; 
judging, impartially, 214; tem- 
perament and age, 220-221. 

Hygiene of teacher's life, 293. 

Hypocrisy, in school work, 10; 
versus genuine acquirement, 
102; in times of peace, 110; the 
worst of vices, 173. 

Idealism, 101; its power in edu- 
cation, 109; in history^ always 
finally successful, 116; in prac- 
tice, 235; of the teacher, 297. 

Ideas, when alive, 8; when func- 
tioning, 55; constitute differ- 
ences among persons, 103. 

Imitation, distinction between 
exercise and study in respect 
to, 10. 

Impulse, defined, 19. 

Incentives, 173. 

Incorrigible pupils, 158, 244, n. 
263. 

Indians, altricious, 221. 

Individual, the, characteristics 
of, 98; powers of, 100; oppor- 
tunities of, 108; varieties of, 
109; to be cared for system- 
atically, 125; attention to^ in 
district school, 131; varjdng 
the program for, 230; help of, 
by teacher, 247; and special 
teacher, 267. 

Inductive recitation, 40; de- 
veloped into scientific method, 
55; and out-of-class study, 71. 

Industrial arts, costly , 36 ; schema, 
267; pedagogy of, 271, et seg. 

Industry, why the mother of 
talent, 109; managers of, 260. 

Informational study, defined, 38; 
its recitation method, 62; how 
marked, 209. 



337 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



Inhibition, hard for motor tem- 
peraments, 14; necessary for 
study, 49. 

Innutrition, 186. 

Insanity, 185. 

Institutions, the social, 109. 

Instruction, defined, 146. 

Intelligence, as a stage in edu- 
cation, 14; grows from curios- 
ity, 91. 

Interest, financial, lesson in, 312- 
313. 

Interest, psychical, defined, 19; 
of teachers, in pupils, 73. 

Irrigation and population, 271. 

Janitor, 240. 

Jefferson, Thomas, quoted, 190. 

Jesus, quoted as to kingdom of 

heaven, 116; and morality, 171. 
Judgment, when good, 101; in 

morals, 113; of human beings, 

214. 

Kant, Immanuel, his Pedagogy 

quoted, 23, 152. 
Kindergarten, a transition device 

between school and home, 75; 

reduces number of laggards, 

208; and age, 222; according to 

Froebel, 226. 
Kingdom of heaven, 116, 139. 
Knowledge, to date important, 

78; encyclopedic, impossible, 

100; a philosophy of, needed by 

teacher, 106. 
Known to unknown, 39; gradual 

nature of process, 54; Locke 

on, 197. 

Laboratory method, 55, 62. 

Laggards, 77; in district school, 
131; often due to incorrect 
marking devices, 210; and de- 
motions, 218; ages in grades, 
222. 

Laymen, view of teacher by, 236, 
et seq. 

Learning, defined, 5, 12; its 



stages^ 5, 12; its processes, 7; 

one thing at a time, 21. 
Lecture, the, as a teaching 

method, 56; how presented, 57; 

to be followed by examination, 

63. 
Lessons, various kinds of, 35; ad- 
vance assignments, 136. 
Library, study in a, 58; for each 

class-room, 255. 
Life, described, 108; its process, 

195-196; preparation for, by 

education, 257. 
Lincoln, Abraham, quoted, 190; 

and agricultural colleges, n. 

264. 
Literacy, 48; how attained, 68. 
Locke, John, his Conduct of the 

Human Understanding quoted, 

197. 
Locus of a study, 9; 223, et seq. 
Logic, inherent in certain studies, 

18; of a lecture, 56; in high 

school subjects, 70. 
Logical study, defined, 38; its 

recitation method, 62; and 

grading the district school, 83; 

each day in district school, 131 ; 

how marked, 209; mathematics, 

227. 
Loyalty as an ideal, 113; the 

highest virtue, 171. 
Luther, Martin, his Letter to 

Mayors quoted, 166. 

Malnutrition, 187. 

Management, defined, 146. 

Mann, Horace, his Annual Report, 
1848, quoted, 65. 

Manual training, 53; special 
teacher for, 74; and discipline, 
158; key to mechanic arts, 271. 

Marching lines, 176. 

Marking systems, compared, 205. 

Marks, tests how recorded in, 63; 
for daily work, 88; how given 
in cities, 202, et seq.; passing, 
214. 

Married women as teachers, 279. 



338 



INDEX 



Materialism, 101, 115; in history 
always defeated, 116. 

Mathematics, and marking, 212; 
in the elementary school, 227. 

Mechanic arts, in high school, 
201 ; schema of, 272. 

Mechanism, in education, 90; 115; 
in discipline, 180; not to dis- 
place personaltiy, 211. 

Medical inspection of schools, 183, 
ei seq. ; 248, et seq. 

Medicine, warning of, as to 
panaceas, 37. 

Memorizing, a late stage in study, 
51. 

Memory, its tricks, 49, 135; its 
training, 254. 

Memory gems, 86. 

Method, illustrated, 16; defined, 
17; of the recitation, 37; ana- 
lytic and synthetic, defined, 52; 
of translation, 57; to be dis- 
covered for each subject, 70; 
to be known by the teacher, 78 ; 
of Nature, 233. 

Mind exhausts body, 222. 

Mitchell, his Past in the Present: 
What Is Civilization? quoted, n. 
263. 

Mixed classes, as to grades, 200, 
208; as to sexes, 200. 

Modesty of opinion in youth, 91. 

Morality, as an educational idea, 
17; as a process, 112; and duty, 
113; as a school-aim, 143; its 
qualities, 169; prescriptive, 191; 
doctrinal and rational, 191; 
varies with age and sex, 194. 

Morning exercises, 122; in district 
school, 132-133. 

Mother, the, in child's life, 74. 

Motivation, source of all educa- 
bility, 18; its two modes of 
manifestation, 19, 29. 

Movements of class, 177. 

Multiplication tables, 33. 

Museum in schools, 82, 256. 

Music, a psychological exercise, 
53; special teacher for, 74. 



National population, 265, 271. 

National wealth, 265. 

Natural science teachers, 262. 

Nature, defined, 107; principles 
of, according to Comenius, 232. 

Nature-study, when to begin, 80; 
importance of, 82; and the 
child, 85; absurd lessons, 124; 
museum, 252; explained, 282. 

Negro, discipline of, 157; segrega- 
tion, 201; precocious, 220. 

Normal school, not the ending of 
education, 78; all-important as 
stage in professional prepara- 
tion, 79. 

Note-books of teachers, 122, 134. 

Obedience, its place in educa- 
tion, 22; its several kinds, 112; 
compelled by the rod, 151; its 
best qualities, how secured, 
167; precedes command, 195. 

Oklahoma, and agriculture, 271. 

Open letters to teachers, 299-302. 

Opportunity, and the individual, 
108; of teacher in the district 
school, 134; education for, 275. 

Oral recitations, inexpensive, 37; 
and ear-mindedness, 48. 

Organization, school, necessary to 
good discipline, 157. 

O'Shea, M. V., his Dynamic Fac- 
tors in Education cited, 281. 

Overschooling, 136. 

Overstrain, 218. 

Panaceas in education, 37. 

Panic, 180. 

Parents, 182, 212; as teachers, 
279. 

Passing mark, 214. 

Patience in teachers, 102, 167, 
244-245. 

Patriotism, 113; and office-hold- 
ing, 114. 

Patten, Simon N., his New Basis 
of Civilization cited, n. 265. 

Peace, a blessing or a curse, 110; 
law of the school, 141. 



339 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



Pedagogy, as guide to school 
organization, 88. 

Penmanship. See Handwriting. 

Periodicities in human life, 293. 

Perry, A. C, his Problems of the 
Elementary School cited, 201. 

Personality versus mechanism, 
211, 213. 

Pestalozzi, his Letter on the Work 
at Hanz quoted, 1, 153. 

Philosophy, of education, 213; of 
life, taught by the teacher, 98; 
of knowledge, needed by the 
teacher, 106. 

Phonic method in reading, 79; 
illustrative lesson, 319-320. 

Physical culture, 53, 63. 

Physical geography, teachers' ex- 
amination, 326. 

Physics, 128; apportioning lesson 
in, 136; teachers' examination, 
326. 

Physiological exercises, 53. 

Physiology, and the child, f 99; 
key to psychology, 106; illus- 
trative lesson, 317-318. 

Plans for year, month, day, 135. 

Plato, his Georgias quoted, 117; 
his Laws quoted, 151, 181. 

Politics, and school discipline, 
161; and janitors, 240; and 
supervisors, 270. 

Pratt Institute, its early leader- 
ship cited, 264. 

Precocity, 31, 218, 219 T 220, 222. 

Preparation, as a step in the in- 
ductive recitation, 39. 

Presentation, as a step in the in- 
ductive recitation, 40; in the 
deductive, 43; in the labora- 
tory, experiment, 55, 62. 

Primary school, the, subjects of, 
80; methods of, 82; teachers 
women, and why, 103; fre- 
quency of grading, 218; course 
too crowded, 229. 

Print, advantages of, over mem- 
ory, 49. 

Process, denned, 36. 



Professional certificates, 215. 

Professional degrees, why diffi- 
cult to secure, 28-29. 

Professional education, 67. 

Professional schools, conducted 
by specialists, 69. 

Professions, the learned, 25; and 
incomes, 89; numbers, 260; de- 
pendent upon teaching, 296. 

Program, daily, in the district 
school, 84; daily, graded, 123- 
126; daily, high school, 127; 
general, for the district, 132- 
133; the short hour, high pres- 
sure day, 231. 

Progress, in course of study, 90; 
in work daily, 137; of pupils, 
229. 

Promotion, in graded schools, 77; 
of dull and frail children, 211; 
qualities to be considered in, 
211; principles involved, 213, 
et seq.; semiannual, 216. 

Psychological exercises, 53. 

Psychological tests of feeble- 
mindedness, 189. 

Psychologist, the teacher as, 80. 

Psychology, its main phases, 19; 
its problems, 22; defined and 
illustrated, 99; not easy, 103; 
key to philosophy, 106; facili- 
ties, not faculties, 111; of indi- 
vidual according to Plato, 181; 
of attention, 238-239. 

Psychophysical parallelism, 11, 
52; in reading, 68. 

Psychophysics, its problems, 19; 
basis of exercises, 52. 

Public opinion and the school, 97; 
as to teachers, 237; of the class, 
244, 246. 

Public school, the various pupils 
of the, according to nationality, 
27; publicity of, 217, 241. 

Punishment, doctrine of, 161, 
245. 

Pupils, distinguished as to abili- 
ties, 12; laggards and dullards, 
77; different in every year, 79; 



340 



INDEX 



in primary grades, 80; view of 
the world by, 93; to be cared 
for, individually, 125; views of 
control, 167; to be studied by 
teachers, 181; defectives and 
deficients, 180-189; not little 
men and women, 193; marks, 
205-207; pushed forward, 208; 
promotions, 212; relative psy- 
chical ages of, 219, et seq.; 
opinions of, respecting good 
teachers, 247; their neatness, 
252; transfer of, 246. 

Pupil self-government, 150. 

Purchasing power of money in 
various parts of our country, 
89. 

Quality, of temperament, 101; 
not a virtue, 170; possibly a 
vice, 170. 

Question-and-answer recitation , 
schema, 242. See also Heuris- 
tic recitation. 

Questions by pupils in recitation, 
32, 112; by teachers, 46-47; 
opinion of, by Fenelon, 91. 

Quintilian, his Institutes of Ora- 
tory quoted, 165. 

Race and age, 219, et seq. 

Rationality, how attained, 22; 
and literacy, 68; of adults, 112; 
in morals, 191. 

Reading, for general meaning, 
51; between the lines, 51; psy- 
chological difficulties, 68; 
teaching methods, 79; illus- 
trative lesson, 318. 

Recess, teachers at, 124. 

Recitations, various kinds of, 34; 
oral inductive, 37, et seq.; as 
observed by visitor, 241. 

Reform schools, 158. 

Regeneration, 171. 

Regimentation, not education, 
134. 

Religion, its true nature, 115. 

Report, upon pupils, form, 204. 



Reproduction of thought of pas- 
sage, 51. 

Requirements for teaching, 289- 
291. 

Research, the increase of, 259. 

Resignation, 250; n. 261. 

Retardation and marks, 210; a 
misfortune, 216. 

Review lesson, method of, 62; 
when to be given, 87, 136; ask- 
ing questions, 242. 

Reviews, by lectures, 56; by tests 
and examinations, 61; in col- 
lege teaching, 81; frequency, 
86. 

Right, its complexity, 171. 

Ripley, William Z., his Races of 
Europe referred to, 80. 

Routine, tendency to, in graded 
school, 77; to be mechanized, 
in a measure, 180. 

Rule, teaching the, 44. 

Rules and regulations, 329-330. 

Rural schools, 83. See also Dis- 
trict school. 

Saint Augustine, his Words of 
the Apostles quoted, 196. 

Saint Paul quoted, 172. 

Saint Peter, his Second Epistle 
quoted, 196, 297. 

Salaries and cultural values, 89; 
and public duty, 114; in In- 
diana, 200; and good teachers, 
216; standard of, 261. 

Schema of lessons, exercises, and 
recitations, 62. 

School, denned by Froebel, opp. 
copyright; a force in civiliza- 
tion, according to Mann, 65; 
and public controversies, 95; 
and State, 111; in the South, 
217; several kinds of, 295. 

School city, 191. 

School committee, 134. 

School congestion, 207. 

School elections, special, n. 200. 

School newspaper, 255. 

School sanitation, 248, et seq, 



341 



CLASS TEACHING AND MANAGEMENT 



School visitors, 134. 

School-boy honor, 113. 

School-house, 180, 240. 

Schooling, denned, 4; cause of 
its bookishness, 36. 

Science, in elementary schools, 
82; in high schools, 127. 

Scientific method, 55. 

Seating a class, 174. 

Secret societies, 115. 

Self-activity of pupils, 256. 

Self-estrangement in discipline, 
160. 

Self-realization, as an educa- 
tional ideal, 21. 

Seminar, method of, 56; member- 
ship of, 57. 

Senses, number of, n. 238; train- 
ing of special, 254. 

Sewing, key to domestic arts, 279. 

Sex, and morality, 194; segrega- 
tion of, 200; and age, 221. 

Social education at school, 93. 

Social indoctrination, as a part of 
education, 27; 192. 

Social institutions, enumerated, 
109. Social movements, 108- 
110. 

Society, the complexity of, 109, 
228. 

Sociologv, defined and illustrated, 
99. 

Socrates, as teacher, 45; quoted, 
152. 

Specialist, as university teacher, 
69; as high school teacher, 70, 
128; as elementary school 
teacher, 74; the several kinds 
of, 267; difficult to secure, 274. 

Speech, its place in human life, 
'68. 

Spelling, of the teacher, 78; 
method of teaching, 256. 

Spencer, Herbert, his Education 
quoted, 283. 

Spinal curvature, 185. 

Story-telling by teachers, 1 22, 280. 

Studies, informational and logi- 
cal, 38; loci of, 223-225. 



Study, meaningless until method 
is known, 16; under direction, 
36; lesson method, 47; peda- 
gogy, 49; principles stated, 51; 
what subjects require most, 51 ; 
of a passage for translation, 57; 
method, 62; amount of, 71; 
time to be devoted to, 231; 
illustrative English lesson of, 
314-315. 

Subject, nature of, defined, 67. 

Supervision and district school, 
134. 

Supervisor, and teacher, 95; 
should study children, 107; 
visits of, 235, et seq. 

Sympathy, requisite in the 
teacher, 102. 

Synthetic method, 52. 

Taxes and schools, 37. 

Teacher, avoids setting oneself 
as model for life work of pupil, 
20; standards of proficiency, 
in elementary school subjects, 
78; in the district school, 84; 
as disciplinarian, 88; salary of, 
89; as interpreter, 93, 104; as 
seen by child, 94, 111; manners 
of, 95; and supervisor, 95; 
usual temperament, 101; gen- 
eral qualities, 102; as reader of 
literature and student of art, 
106; extremes of duties, 119; 
limits of brilliant, 129; of dull, 
129; mood at school, 138; 
judging the, 235; attire, 240; 
technical skill, 243; voice, 244; 
member, 260; qualifications re- 
quired, 261; relieved by spe- 
cialists, 270; life of the, 285, 
et seq. ; open letters to, 299- 
302. 

Teaching, test of skill in, 6; the 
two purposes of, 25; as an art 
discussed, 26; too little or too 
much, 31; stages of, 33; bad, 
irremediable in an exercise, 54; 
four kinds of ? 69; and good 



342 



INDEX 



school equipment, 120; a privi- 
lege, 139. 

Technical sciences, costly, 36. 

Teeth, 187. 

Telling is not teaching, 33. 

Temperaments, distinguished, 13; 
varied success in education, 14; 
in life, 15; acquiring qualities 
not congenital, 20; attitudes of 
children of various, toward 
adults, 30; difference at same 
ages, 31; and study, 50; and 
response to ideas, 81; according 
to Ascham, 81; and philosophy 
of life, 98; of teachers, 101; de- 
scribed as reactions, 108; and 
theories of discipline, 156; bad- 
ness at school, 174; and ages, 
220-221; and education, 228; 
and mechanic arts, 274. 

Temperature and humidity, 250. 

Tenure of office, 158; in New 
Jersey, n. 200; 287. 

Terminology in education, 145. 

Tests, place of, in school, 58; pur- 
pose of, 59; use in studies, 63; 
frequency of, 86; by higher 
officers, 215; examples of, 312, 
et seq. 

Text-book, true to logic and na- 
ture of its subject, 18; nature 
of, defined, 36; 48; publishers, 
303. 

Thwing, Charles F., his History 
of Higher Education in Amer- 
ica quoted, 296. 

Titchener, Edward B., his Out- 
lines of Psychology cited, n. 
238. 

Toilet, visiting the, 177; proper 
conveniences, 250. 



Tolstoi, his What Is Art? cited, 56. 
Topical recitation, 32. 
Tradition, its force in modern 

life, 109. 
Translation, method of, 57. 
Truth as school aim, 143. 

Union school, 82. 

Unity, of character, 170; of mind, 
111. 

Universal school, the, 201, 280. 

University, policy as to degrees, 
28, 29; as to examinations, 61; 
teaching methods of the, 69, 
81; studies at, 80; extension, 
259; metropolitan, size of, 260. 

Vacation of the teacher, 295. 

Vice, the nature of, 170. 

Virtue, of each temperament, 
101; not to be assumed, 110; 
every-day, 143; a golden mean, 
170; nature is endeavor, 172; 
none all good, 190; at school, 
194; growth according to Saint 
Peter, 196, 298; of class, 238. 

Visitor at school, 241. 

Visualization exercises, 254. 

War, as blessing or curse, 110. 
Wardrobe at school, 241. 
Weber, his History of Philosophy 

cited on Hegel, n. 107. 
Whispering, 189, n. 238. _ 
Wisdom, the principal thing, 116. 
Worry, 294. 
Written work at school, 86; 131; 

as seen by visitor, 251. 

Youth, appreciation of teacher 
by high school, 96. See Pupils. 



THE END 



OCT 8 1810 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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